Serving licenses / sharing files at different locations

Discussion created by Ken Schmidling on Apr 21, 2008
Latest reply on May 14, 2008 by Jim Zink

Like • Show 0 Likes0
Comment • 5

We currently use Solidworks licenses at one location in one state. We are considering deploying Solidworks at a location in another state. I'm looking for information from someone who has familiarity with serving licenses and sharing files across locations in different states. I would think serving licenses would not be a big deal but perhaps sharing files may create some issues. I would like to know more about what I can expect before going forward with the project and any information would be greatly appreciated.

Outcomes

5 Replies

Kevin Silbert Apr 22, 2008 1:36 PM
We have a VPN between locations in two states... It works great for license sharing, and would as well for sharing files as a local network, except that we're stuck at the end of a T1 at one location so it's hideously slow. That slowness wreaked havoc on PDMWorks Workgroup, since each checkout and checkin had to send all the data across our rickety VPN.

We've since upgraded to PDMWorks Enterprise, and have identical servers in both locations, with replication set up to synchronize all files daily. This works great- the metadata (small!) gets synchronized immediately, and if a file is requested in one location that was just checked in at the other, it sends it immediately, but otherwise, the massive data transfer takes place at midnight when 60 employees aren't all streaming YouTube videos to their desktop...
Like • Show 0 Likes0
Actions
- Mohamed Abdel Moniem @ Kevin Silbert on Apr 22, 2008 2:24 PM
  yes that's wright the VPN is the solution for sharing the license. I think Global Santafee Drilling company is doing the same
  Like • Show 0 Likes0
  Actions
  - Lucas Dexter @ Mohamed Abdel Moniem on May 14, 2008 10:04 AM
    Hello,
    I just set up our four subsidiaries in four states to hit a local server in one location. It's been about six weeks since I set them up and all is well except, as Kevin mentioned, one of our sites has a T1 line. The division with the T1 line is having some issues because the line randomly goes down for a few hours at a time. The other subs, however are not seeing any degregation. My interim fix for the T1 sub is to have them check out a license for a given period of time until we can find a better solution. It kind of defeats the purpose of having a network license but they needed a quick solution to keep running. Anyone have a better solution for me with the T1?
    
    Hope that helps
    
    LD
    Like • Show 0 Likes0
    Actions
    - Kevin Silbert @ Lucas Dexter on May 14, 2008 11:24 AM
      Lucas- Have you thought about setting up 3 distributed license servers in the "Triad" configuration mentioned in the installation help? I've always been curious about that, but I assume it must be pretty fault-tolerant. I wish they had "Duo" as an option...
      Like • Show 0 Likes0
      Actions
      - Jim Zink @ Kevin Silbert on May 14, 2008 1:28 PM
        The Triad server option is only for servers in one location.
        
        You can set up redundant servers in multiple locations very easily. In the client setup, list the server names in order of preference. If a user tries to get a license from the first server on the list and none are available, it will go to the next server to request a license. If the WAN goes down, you're limited to licenses on your local server, but it's better than nothing.
        
        The biggest limitation with this setup is that "subsequent" licenses must come from the same server as the base license. For example, let's say you obtained a license for "core" SolidWorks from server B. Now you want to use PhotoWorks, so a request for a subsequent Office Pro license goes out. If there are no Office Pro licenses available on Server B, you can't get one, even if there are many available on servers A and C.
        
        This is covered in the redundant license server options section of the FlexLM User Guide.
        Like • Show 0 Likes0
        Actions

Serving licenses / sharing files at different locations

Outcomes

Related Content

Recommended Content