On the other hand users may borrow licenses to network workstations, borrow licenses for no reason and other action that can highly reduce the usage efficiency of licenses. The tools provided by OpenLM for ESRI ArcGIS accompanied by a reasonable policy set by the management can help you avoid the risks of the FLEXlm license borrowing functionality.This article describes the required steps to enable borrowing and how to use the borrowing functionality.
Enabling Borrowing (Done by Administrator)
Start –> ArcGis –> License Manager –> License Server AdministratorAllow Borrowing – Enable/Disable the functionality
Max Borrow Time – Set the minimum time possible. Very long borrowing periods can highly compromise the license usage efficiency.
Audit Log – The location of the log.
Your settings are stored in Registry a registry branch on your license server:
HKLMSoftwareESRIArcGIS License Manager 10.0
The following keys can be found:
BORROW_ENABLED
MAX_BORROW_TIME
When you click “Apply”, license is re-read (Equal to the lmutil lmreread command. The benefit of this command is that system administrators can make changes without stopping the FLEXlm service).
Using Borrowing (Done by the borrowing user)
At the workstation, borrowing action is done by using the “ArcGis Administrator” tool. The workstation has to be connected to the network while borrowing.
Start the ArcGIS Administrator by using:
Start –> ArcGIS –> ArcGis Administrator
Select the Borrow/Return tab.
The user needs to check the feature he wants to borrow
After borrow is confirmed, the borrowed feature will not be available to other users and the system will show the return date:
At the ESRI Audit.log (which location was defined at first step) you can find borrow details:
Using the lmutil lmstat command FLEXlm shows this output:
Users of Viewer: (Total of 1 license issued; Total of 1 license in use)
“Viewer” v10.0, vendor: ARCGIS
floating license
ACTIVATED LICENSE(S) olm-arcgis10 ACTIVATION (v10.0) (192.168.1.248/27000 102), start Thu 8/12 15:15
In OpenLM Version 1.6 active products TAB:
With ESRI ARCGIS vendor daemon FLEXlm does not show the borrowing user, it writes the word “Activated License(s)”. Other software products that use FLEXlm report the user that actually borrowed the Feature.
Releasing the license back to the license pool
Releasing the license is easy. Make sure the machine is connected to the network, open ArcGIS Administrator and release the license. The license can be released even before the the target date.
If the borrowed FEATURE is not returned to the license pool by the user the borrowing will expire automatically on the due date and will be available to all network users.
Summary
ArcGIS Desktop version 10 features the long awaited feature of license borrowing. This functionality allows users to borrow licenses to their workstation and by that to convert a floating license to a node-locked license for a limited period of time. This functionality allows users to take their ArcGIS Desktop software to the field (ArcInfo, ArcEditor, ArcView). OpenLM for ESRI ArcGIS fully supports the borrowing functionality.
