I was out of commission for about 12 hours!. My remote Indie license wouldn't run. Can we get a warning next time about server maintenance??

Hi @cushwa,

We had a power outage here in Toronto that caused the disruption. For next time there is an environment variable (`ENABLE_OFFLINE_LIC=1`) to keep your licenses viable for up to 3 days in the event of a disruption like the one over the weekend. Note that the current offline licensing is rather limited in that you cant restart hserver as we dont store the licensing information.

Again sorry for the inconvenience this has caused you!

Cheers,

There is also a notice about this outage here [www.sidefx.com].

Oh man, if the license server is down then Houdini won't work, I hope that changes soon as it seems every day there is always a fight with any licensing system. The people truly penalised are the ones that pay for product!

So License server is down again, good job I'm not on a deadline. Would the be any chance of a 7 day grace from when you last logged in?

Theres a 3 day grace period (there are no plans currently to adjust this time period) which is currently blocked behind the environment variable. We are planning on removing this restriction in a upcoming production build. Please keep in mind that Login Licensing is currently labelled as Beta as we work throw issues like the one seen a couple of days ago.

Cheers,

mattw
Theres a 3 day grace period (there are no plans currently to adjust this time period) which is currently blocked behind the environment variable. We are planning on removing this restriction in a upcoming production build. Please keep in mind that Login Licensing is currently labelled as Beta as we work throw issues like the one seen a couple of days ago.

Cheers,

Hi Mattw,

Thanks for the response, unfortunately, the server has gone again, every morning now I'm kicked out and lose about 15 mins work or so. How do we enable this 3 day grace? I'd rather 3 day than being kicked out due to license server dying, why does it check which seems every minute? Can't it just check on launch and then forget about it?

The place `ENABLE_OFFLINE_LIC=1` in your houdini.env file.

Pixelised
why does it check which seems every minute? Can't it just check on launch and then forget about it?

The license check cannot just be at the beginning. If the license check is only done once at the beginning at any point after that initial check the license could become invalid or expired and the one license check will not capture this. That means someone could run Houdini with an invalid license.

Cheers,

Hi Matt,

Thanks and I've only just seen this with the licence attribute in the env file. Thanks for that.

Only problem is, and it seems daily with my hour here and there with my Houdini time, the server has borked again. Now I get a:

License Error: Unable to connect to hserver for license acquisition

Arrghh, everytime I get some play time, I always have server issues. Is this going to get resolved anytime soon? I'm using 15.400 at the moment, is there a better version to use? Or is it the servers aren't quite up to the demand of the users?

Scott

(Serious question): Why don't you run a regular local licensing setup? Like: no remote license, but a local license server. From what I understand this works also for the indie edition.

I've tried resetting my password as it mentions something about resetting credentials to no avail.

It seems every day there are licensing issues when I get the time to do some Houdini time, it's such a shame, I thought I'd have an hour tonight, but no, 15 minutes tops, a crash and then license issues.

@Pixelised Login licensing is currently listed as Beta so I would not suggest using it for any serious work apart from testing login licensing itself. As @protozoan suggested using a locally installed server is likely better for production work while login licensing issues get resolved.

Cheers,

protozoan
(Serious question): Why don't you run a regular local licensing setup? Like: no remote license, but a local license server. From what I understand this works also for the indie edition.

Oh, I had no idea, I thought using the license BETA version would be the right thing to do. I'm not into IT stuff, IP addresses and stuff just fly over my head. And I used to program aviation related technical training!!

I'll look into this local server as the BETA licensing is driving me mad. Thanks.

@Pixelised you can also try using API licensing as that should keep you logged in behind the scenes with little initial work on your end.

Cheers,

Arrghh, I think I've completely borked my licensing system, I don't seem to have licenses now, I've gone over to my own server, I can't see any information to the Indie product at all now. I think I need to give up tonight, it has been a long day! Will try again tomorrow night.