Redundant or Single Server Licensing

[Ruben]

I am getting ready to decommission the server that hosts the license manager service. I am debating in my mind whether I should go with a redundant server configuration or stay with a single server configuration. From your experience, what would you recommend and why?

[rkmcswain]

How many clients in how many physical locations?

[Ruben]

How many clients in how many physical locations?

Good question. Sorry. We have about 20 users in a one location. If I go with the redundant option one of the servers will be a virtual VMware server. That server is currently only performing domain controller functions.

[Buffeldrek]

Well redundant is saver - abd for 20 users - and you'll have the budget to create a redundant setup - i'll go for it.

One compagny I was CAD manager, had about 80 licenses - the licenseserver was configured redundant - in the 3 years i was there - the licenseserver only jumped once to the redundant config.

Presently - with another compagny - 100 licences - we have only 1 server - unfortunally the license server kick us out a little more. Anyway the server is end of life - and planning is to set up a redundant system as well.

[rkmcswain]

Well redundant is saver ...and planning is to set up a redundant system as well.

Curious as to your reasons for choosing redundant.

Everything I have ever heard from Autodesk recommends a distributed model including the networking AU classes instructed by Jerry Milana and Nate Bartley.

Reference links:
http://autodesk.blogs.com/between_th...d_network.html
http://support.autodesk.com/getdoc.asp?ID=TS69086

[pblanche123288]

We use a single server solution, and simply mirror the hard disks, and use team nics, as this provides fault tollerance, and fail over, so far after 5 years, of doing things this way, we have not had a cad license server go down completely, and never had a user winge about "whats going on" we have burned out a nic, and one HDD.

< $150 in 5 years, is a cheap and so far for us pretty efficient use of resources and money.

PS Redundent is 2 servers, but distributed is 3, and who has 3 boxes, running a text file these days, is not a virtual server easier to manage anyhow, (you could just have a single hardware solution, and 3 instances of windows running on it under VMware/Virtual server, and then just distribute to your hearts content, (at $140 a pop XP is cheap enough to do that with at least)

(and dont laugh, but we only just upgraded our adlm to xp, it was running NT4 for so long it aint funny. .... ahhh nt4 now theres a fond memory.... )

[rkmcswain]

PS Redundent is 2 servers, but distributed is 3,

Not necessarily, Distributed can be 2 servers.

[Ruben]

Not necessarily, Distributed can be 2 servers.

And redundant is 3 not 2.

Any way, I'm still not 100% sure. I am leaning towards a redundant configuration. I was just wanting to see if others had had problems with it. But, it doesn't look like it. I actually tried configuring it once, but when acquiring the license from AutoDesk I chose to append rather than overwrite the License file, and I don't think it took it, even though Autodesk reported the License activation as successful. So, I am going to have to try it again telling it to overwrite the license file. That initial hiccup is what made me nervous about going with that scheme.

[DarrenYoung]

From the license server standpoint, distributed is the same as single, it's just multiple "single server" configurations. The clients, differ in a distributed environment because they can point to a list of license servers and if one is unreachable or maxed out, it'll roll over to the next. Any one license server goes down, the licenses residing on that server are unavailable but those on all other servers are still available as long as there's network connectivity to them. Distributed can be 2 or more.

Redundant on the other hand, requires a slightly different license file than single or distributed as it lists three servers. Redundant is 3 license servers running in concert. No more, no less. If any one goes down, all licenses are still available.

As I read it, it's my understanding that someone was talking about instead of running a redundant configuration on 3 seperate boxes, they were going to do it on 1 box with multiple VMWare servers running. There is absolutely not reason that I can think of to do this. If you hardware fails, all your VMWare servers are down and all your licenses are lost. If your hardware has failover that prevents it from going down, then your licenses would still be available but so would it in a distributed model. A single box running 3 VMWare servers for a redundant license model, has no benefit as it's single hardware platform negates the benefits of a redundant model. The ONLY benefit would be of the OS in one of the VMWare servers went down or onew of the VMWare servers was rebooted often. A server's OS simply shouldn't be rebooted or go down frequently.

With a distriburted model, you get some of the benefits of a redundant model except if one of the servers goes down, you loose only those licenses. You can, however, setup another license server on any box (not just a server) fairly easily. If my 2 license servers went down, I could be up and running again in less than 1/2 hour so why complicate things with a redundant configuration. Especially with the netwqork license activation utilities to get your network licenses. If you had a 2 server distributed model, you'd only need an updated license file on the second server to get up and runinng again.

The really combersome problem with all this is the clients. If you setup your cleints already pointing to multiple servers, they'll automatically point to a new server with updated license counts. The trouble is, you might not know what the server names are. For that reason, I use DNS entries to point to my license servers. I've got a FLEXLM1.COLDPSRINGGRANITE.COM and FLEXLM2.COLDSPRINGGRANITE.COM DNS entry that the clients use to find their license servers. If the license server moves to a new box, I update the DNS entries and the clients automatically point to the new server all without updating the clients. I also have all client point to a 3rd, non-existant license server called FLEXLM3.COLDSPRINGGRANITE.COM. At any time I could implement a 3rd or move one to another box and all the clients would automatically find it without reconfiguring them.