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How to serve a license key to client machines through a firewall

Question & Answer


Question

How do you configure IBM Rational Common Licensing to serve license keys through firewalls?

Cause

Just opening the ports on the firewall will not allow the client machines outside the firewall to get a license from the License Key Server. The License Key Server also has to be configured to use these specific ports.

Answer

How to point a client machine outside a firewall to the License Key Server
  1. Open two bidirectional (two-way communication) ports on the firewall
    • one for the license manager daemon (lmgrd.exe)
    • one for the IBM Rational vendor daemon (ibmratl.exe).

      Any port numbers can be used but FLEXlm recommends 27000 for lmgrd and any other ports between 27001 and 27009 for the ibmratl daemon.

      If you need information on how to open ports on a firewall, contact your firewall software vendor.

      If your firewall is Windows firewall, navigate to Control Panel, System and Security and Windows Defender Firewall.
    • Select Advanced settings and highlight Inbound Rules in the left pane.
    • Select and then right click Inbound Rules and select New Rule.
    • Add the port you need to open and click Next.
    • Add the protocol (TCP or UDP) and the port number into the next window and click Next.
    • Select Allow the connection in the next window and click Next.
    • Select the network profile(s) as desired and click Next.
    • Give the rule a meaningful name and optionally a description and then click Finish.
    • Since the open ports should allow for bi-directional communication, you follow the same process for Outbound Rules.

  2. Once these ports have been opened on the firewall, they will need to be specified on the SERVER and VENDOR lines within the license file.

    On UNIX and Linux platforms:
    Locate the *.dat license file and use a text editor to modify the daemon lines to look like the example below:

    SERVER <hostname> <hostid> 27000
    DAEMON ibmratl /usr/local/flexlm/sun4_solaris2/ibmratl port=27002


    On Windows platform:
    Locate the rational_server_perm.dat and the rational_server_temp.dat license files on the License Key Server.
    By default these files will be stored in:
  • C:\Program Files (x86)\IBM\RationalRLKS\common\
  • Modify the daemon lines to look like the example below:

    SERVER <hostname> <host ID> 27000
    VENDOR ibmratl port=27002



    OR
  • 1. Open the License Key Administrator on the License Key Server
    2. Click Settings and select Server Ports
    3. Enter the ports opened for each of the daemons and click OK.|
    image 4423
    Note: If your attempt to change the server ports using the License Key Administrator (LKAD) results in the FLEXlm service stopping with error messages in the logs about missing host ID, then you need to modify the license file manually as described above.
  1. After the License Key Server has been configured, go to the client machine.

On UNIX and Linux platforms:
Set the Environment variable
LM_LICENSE_FILE=<port#>@<server host name or IP address>
Example: setenv LM_LICENSE_FILE 27000@<hostname>


Note: You must stop and restart the IBM Rational License Key Server for these changes to take effect.

Kill all the current lmgrd and rational process that belong to rational
% /bin/ps -ef | grep lmgrd

Start the License Key Server using one of the below:
%cd <Rational>/config/start_lmgrd_on_<your machine>
or
%lmgrd -c <license file> -l <flexlm log file>


On Windows platform:
  1. Open the License Key Administrator
  2. Access Settings and select Client/Server Configuration
  3. Update Settings by entering the lmgrd port used for the selected License Key Server and clicking OK.

  4. The client should then be able to get a license from the server.
     
  • If you have installed any IBM Rational Software Development Platform, or Eclipse based, products that are configured to use floating user license support:

    1. Open the Installation Manager > Manage Licenses

    2. Select the product ( for example IBM Rational Performance Tester)

    3. Select Configure Floating license support and click Next

    4. Select I accept the terms of the license agreements and click Next

    5. Select the line where the License Key Server is mentioned

    6. Click on Edit (the pencil symbol)

    7. Enter the lmgrd port number in the "Edit Server" window and click OK

    8. Click Finish

    Once the ports have been confirmed, follow the steps to manually update the license file(s) on the License Key Server, as described above.

    Note: If you are in a Wide Area Network (WAN) or Virtual Private Network (VPN), increasing the Server Wait Time (License Key Administrator>Settings) from the default 5 seconds to 25 seconds will give the clients ample time establish a connection and obtain licenses from the server.

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Document Information

Modified date:
22 June 2020

UID

swg21257370