Autodesk Suites FLEXLM Network licensing Tip

There is something I find really annoying with FLEXLM licensing, I really have to be lucky to get it running correctly at the first time after installation. Everytime I have another issue. After all the years of trouble and happyness I think soon I have all the solutions for different License Manager behavior sorted out.

Autodesk Suites new get delivered on a (Oversized) USB stick

This time I had the problem that I used the Hostname of my machine to get the license file. I have a new computer and installed the Maya Creatove Suite Premium from scratch. After installing and configuring the License Manager (LMTOOLS) the license server worked fine, I have seen all my available licenses ready to go.

After starting Maya, Maya have not found my license and gave me an Error 20...

Error 20

When you take a look at the license file you may see your Hostname instead of an IP adress.

FLEXLM License File

Now you can do two things, either change the Hostname in the license file to your IP adress or make Windows realise the connection between your IP adress and your Hostname using the hosts.ini file.

hosts.ini

For Windows 7 go to C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc and open the hosts.ini file in a texteditor, then fill in a new line with your IP adress on the left and your hostname on the right like this:

123.456.78.9 YOURWORKSTATIONNAME

Save it and you are done, Maya/Softimage or whatever you use should start now.

There are a lot of other things that can happen using FLEXLM licensing. Here a few common problems that can happen:

Problem
Forgot to install the licensing server after installation of Maya/Softimage or other Products

Solution
Always doublecheck if you have installed the licensing server. you can do this before or after the installation of your Autodesk product. This is one problem that occurs often because you are eager to start shifting polygons and create nice imagery and forget to install the license server, veeeery annoying, hehe

Problem
Installed the Standalone Product instead of the Network licensed Product. When Installing your Product you will be asked to install either the standalone or Network version of your product. It may happen that you oversee the two checkboxes and just go with the default value "Standalone", that way Network licensing is not possible

Make sure you select the correct Licensing System while installing

Solution
Uninstall the product and reinstall again using Network License activation.

Problem
After a restart suddenly the licensing does not work anymore.

Solution
This seems like a IP problem. Compare your actual IP adress with the one you use for the licensing server. Check if you have a dynamic IP adress using DHCP. Make sure that you either use a fixed IP without using DHCP or configure the DHCP server so that it supplies a fixed IP to the license server.

More Help
For more Help/Tutorials check the Autodesk installation help website