License server randomly stopping

[adrencg]

While in the middle of working, I'll get a crash -- then when I try to restart Softimage 2014 I get the error message "there is no interactive license available to run Softimage." -- then I have to open LMTools and restart the service.

Does this happen to anyone else?

I'm sorry that I forgot that I made a post about this recently...Steve Blair has already tried to help me, but maybe there's someone who tried something weird and fixed the problem. I have almost no hope that contacting Autodesk will get this resolved, because let's be real about it.

[xsisupport]

I don't know about the phone numbers, but there's a whole team dedicated to licensing issues. Can you log a support request through the Sub center?

[adrencg]

Ok this is odd....

When using LMTools, the status of the server is "running"...

But, when going into my services panel, it says I have 2 FLEXLM license servers. 32 and 64. Their status was stopped and set to manual. I've set the 64 version to automatic and started it.

Hopefully that fixes the problem. How was Softimage starting before if the service wasn't actually running?

[adrencg]

I don't know about the phone numbers, but there's a whole team dedicated to licensing issues. Can you log a support request through the Sub center?

Yeah I did that a few minutes ago...hopefully I fixed it with what I just wrote about. What do you think about that situation? Is it weird to have 2 FLEX LM license servers show up in my services panel? And neither one was running, yet Softimage was working.

[xsisupport]

I don't know about the phone numbers, but there's a whole team dedicated to licensing issues. Can you log a support request through the Sub center?

Yeah I did that a few minutes ago...hopefully I fixed it with what I just wrote about. What do you think about that situation? Is it weird to have 2 FLEX LM license servers show up in my services panel? And neither one was running, yet Softimage was working.

Were those named "FLEXnet Licensing Service " ? Those are not the service that LMTOOLS starts. The name of that service will be whatever name you entered in LMTOOLS.

[adrencg]

Ahh, ok...my service is named Flexlm Service 1 and it's running. So are those Flexnet services that weren't running crucial to something?

[xsisupport]

Ahh, ok...my service is named Flexlm Service 1 and it's running. So are those Flexnet services that weren't running crucial to something?

Those are for standalone licensing. Trial mode is standalone, so maybe that's where they came from.

[adrencg]

Hey Steve can I get a little more help, because I think I may be on to something... You wrote specifically about a certain problem on a blog once....

http://xsisupport.com/2012/07/28/the-case-of-the-flexnet-licensing-error-97121/


I checked and that's the exact error I'm getting (97 121). Is there maybe some kind of port conflict? The only FLEX product I have installed is Softimage (2013 and 2014) -- at least to my knowledge. Is there something I can check for in Windows firewall -- maybe checking port availability? There has to be some reason my server keeps stopping. Thanks for any advice you can give.

[xsisupport]

Hey Steve can I get a little more help, because I think I may be on to something -- and the guy at Autodesk hasn't been a whole lot of help. You wrote specifically about a certain problem on a blog once....

http://xsisupport.com/2012/07/28/the-case-of-the-flexnet-licensing-error-97121/


I checked and that's the exact error I'm getting (97 121). Is there maybe some kind of port conflict? The only FLEX product I have installed is Softimage (2013 and 2014) -- at least to my knowledge. Is there something I can check for in Windows firewall -- maybe checking port availability? There has to be some reason my server keeps stopping. Thanks for any advice you can give.

Sorry, I don't have a fix, I'll just tell you how I would investigate.

There are many possible reasons for that error, including this.

First, I would make sure we have a clean, known-good starting point:

- Install the latest Autodesk Network License Manager.
- Delete any existing licensing services. Double check that there are no lmgrd.exe or adskflex.exe processes running.
- Edit the .lic and hard code a specific port for lmgrd (see the link in my blog post you linked to above). Try 27000.
- Define a new service in LMTOOLS.
- Put the LMTOOLS debug log in append mode (for future troubleshooting).
- Get the license up and running. .

Then, if the license server stops again, before you start the server again:

- check both the LMTOOLS debug log and %TEMP%\SoftimageLicense.log
- confirm whether or not lmgrd and adskflex are still running (Windows Task Manager, or download Process Explorer, or use tasklist on the command line)
- check whether something else is using the ports 2080 and 27000 (use netstat -ano | find "27000" on the command line)

[adrencg]

Thanks Steve. After reading through your post, I did some snooping to see what was going on. I Do have the latest Network License Manager 11.11. I also noticed there are 2x lmgrd.exe running. I don't know if that's important, but there are two.

Something is funny because I had a folder Program Files/Autodesk/Autodesk Network License manager ---- and another folder Program Files/Autodesk Network License Manager.

I had a license file dated 4/24 in the first folder and that's the license that was being used by LMTOOLS. That's the only thing in that folder.

In the other folder was all of the exe files (lmgrd, adskFlex, etc) and 2 license files -- soft 2013 and 2014. The 2014 license was dated 5/3, but was not being used.

Confusing? Probably. Anyway I set the path to license file to the newer one, and hopefully that will fix my problem. I don't even know how I got that extra folder, nor do I know which one is supposed to be the correct one -- although I'm assuming its the one with the executables inside it.

If it starts happening again, I'll uninstall all Network License Manager stuff and start from scratch. Maybe someday there'll be a license manager that doesn't waste half my time. I just went through a whole thing with RLM licenses. Anyway, thanks again.

[xsisupport]

Thanks Steve. After reading through your post, I did some snooping to see what was going on. I Do have the latest Network License Manager 11.11. I also noticed there are 2x lmgrd.exe running. I don't know if that's important, but there are two.

Something is funny because I had a folder Program Files/Autodesk/Autodesk Network License manager ---- and another folder Program Files/Autodesk Network License Manager.

I had a license file dated 4/24 in the first folder and that's the license that was being used by LMTOOLS. That's the only thing in that folder.

In the other folder was all of the exe files (lmgrd, adskFlex, etc) and 2 license files -- soft 2013 and 2014. The 2014 license was dated 5/3, but was not being used.

Confusing? Probably. Anyway I set the path to license file to the newer one, and hopefully that will fix my problem. I don't even know how I got that extra folder, nor do I know which one is supposed to be the correct one -- although I'm assuming its the one with the executables inside it.

If it starts happening again, I'll uninstall all Network License Manager stuff and start from scratch. Maybe someday there'll be a license manager that doesn't waste half my time. I just went through a whole thing with RLM licenses. Anyway, thanks again.

There are always two lmgrd processes. One is the master that controls everything, and then there is another for each vendor. The vendor lmgrd takes care of running the vendor daemon (in this case, adskflex). At least that's how I remember it.

The Autodesk Network License Manager install folder moved at some point, so that's why you have two. One from an older version of the Autodesk network license manager, and one from a newer version.