XSI 2 and licenses

[hypersim]

Where are all the licenses for XSI 2.0? My college has been waiting on the licenses for some time now; we have everything installed but there seems to be a delay. Apparently a lot of companies are waiting; is this true?

[devdoka]

Yes, Softimage is swamped right now with license requests.

Normally during a new release, only a fraction of the user base needs a new license as existing customers would use the license lookup tool where their new key would be ready and waiting. Because existing customers' license info is known ahead of time, Softimage can generate the upgrade tokens before/while the software ships and then deal with the new customers as they receive their software. Dealing with new customers is generally a manual process.

With v2.0 the entire XSI user base needs to get new license keys generated because XSI no longer uses FlexLM licensing software, but instead, SPM. As a result, none of the license keys could be generated prior to shipping and what's happening is that there is more demand than Softimage can handle. You'll just have to wait as there are several thousand customers and only a few people in Montreal who deal with licensing. Expect a few weeks delay.

This won't happen every release per the above mentioned reasons.

Matt

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Matt Lind
Animator / Technical Director
Softimage certified instructor:
Softimage|3D
Softimage|XSI
speye_21@hotmail.com

[pnoizat2]

we need to install our copies as well, can you install xsi refering to its correct licence server, prior to recieving your licence....?

I sort of need it all licenced to test the render farm etc before the image is ghosted across 150 computers......
just a little bit stressful.

[devdoka]

Yes, you can install the software before a license key is available - you just won't be able to run XSI until the key is installed.

When prompted during installation for a license server, simply enter the name of the host machine (or IP number), then click "Add". This will put your server's name into the setenv.bat file (or .softimage file on UNIX) for the current computer. This can be editted later using a text editor if you screw up.

Matt

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Matt Lind
Animator / Technical Director
Softimage certified instructor:
Softimage|3D
Softimage|XSI
speye_21@hotmail.com

[nuclearman]

Question for Mr. Lind: on pg 24 of the Setup and Licensing manual for XSI 2.0, it says under "Multiple Hardware Keys" that "If you receive more than one hardware key from various Softimage product packages, please make sure you use only one on the same license server. Make all requests for all you licenses by referencing a single hardware key: the Softimage vendor daemon can communicate with only one key at a time." Now, I'm running 3.9.2 and XSI 1.5 on a non-networked single-processor NT, and these packages have run just fine with the old Flexlm dongle system attached to the parallel port. When XSI 2.0 arrived from JourneyEd yesterday, I hooked up the new SPM dongle to the Com 2 port as indicated on the green "READ ME FIRST" sheet included with the package; the implication was that I could still run the older versions of the program since the Flexlm dongle was on the parallel port. Because the "server" is the same computer I'm running all the software on, I assumed I should set the SPM license server the same way I set the Flexlm license server -- as a "local install" designating "micron733" (the freestanding NT) as the license server. Yet, after doing so, I only got error messages concerning the SPM license server; I couldn't get LicTools to generate any kind of request.

I'm really not sure what I'm doing wrong. Does the statement on pg 24 of the Setup & Licensing manual mean that I can't run 2.0 on the same system that has a Flexlm dongle? Or should I try reinstalling XSI 2.0 as a "server install" instead of a local install? Given the long queue for getting the license keys, I'd like to resolve this basic setup question asap, but it has been my experience that Journey Education provides very poor customer support for Softimage. Any insights you can provide would be greatly appreciated!

--Michael H. Crawford
Department of Anthropology
University of Kansas

[devdoka]

I usually don't answer such questions as that's tech support's job, but I will just this once. Expect some inaccuracies somewhere as I'm not Softimage tech support

Since v2.0 uses SPM and not FlexLM, you can run both softwares at the same time with the two different dongles. It's working on my machine, it's advertised as doable, and so you should be able to run both as well.

The FlexLM dongle goes on the parallel port, the SPM dongle connects to your serial ports using the supplied 25->9 pin adapter. The SPM dongle will not work if installed on the parallel port.

By default, SPM looks for it's dongle on COM2, which defaults to serial port 2. If you edit the spm-config.ini file in your c:winntsystem32spm directory, you can change it to the other serial port. There's an environment variable towards the top of the file that provides this option.

To generate a license request, SPM must be running and looking at the proper port for the dongle (accessible thru lictools). Otherwise, you'll get a "Cannot find COM...." message. Also make sure you have the SPM_HOST environment variable defined. This tells SPM which machine acts as the SPM server.

After you've done all of the above, click the "generate license request" button in the lictools application then send that in to your reseller/tech support provider. They'll send back a license key in a file called "xxxxxx-SI0.keys", where xxxx is a cryptic code number. When this file comes back, open lictools and click the "install keys file" button then select the keys file in the popup file browser. I suggest placing the keys file in the spm directory before installing it (and keep a backup of the keys file elsewhere for safekeeping, such as on a readily accessible floppy).

Once the keys file is installed, you can run XSI. If not, rinse and repeat until all goes well. I've noticed that if you use custom 25->9 pin adapters instead of one provided in the box, you may have problems getting SPM to recognize the dongle.

Summary:

1) Install XSI software.
2) Connect 25->9 pin adapter to SPM dongle. then attach to serial port #2 of your machine.
3) Install SPM license server. Use machine's name when prompted for the SPM server name.
4) Start SPM server.
5) Generate license request file. Submit to your reseller/tech support provider.
6) Install returned license key using lictools.
7) Start XSI.

That's all I know of.

Matt

---

Matt Lind
Animator / Technical Director
Softimage certified instructor:
Softimage|3D
Softimage|XSI
speye_21@hotmail.com

[nuclearman]

Many thanks for the help in sorting out my SPM problem; it seems that my NT's modem was actually utilizing the COM 2 port, even though nothing was obstructing the external "COM 2" connection (which just goes to show how little I understand the technicalities of these things, though I'm slowly learning). When I followed the order of steps you provided -- install software first, then connect the SPM dongle to the COM 1 port, then install licensing and edit the file to read "COM 1" -- I was actually able to generate the license request. Perhaps the problem was that I'd connected the dongle first, then installed the licensing software, then XSI 2.0, then edited the line ... whatever, the method you outlined solved the problems.

One interesting note: although contacting Journey Education for technical support has proven, in the past, to be a major headache, I decided to see whether the technical support folks at Softimage would actually help someone on an academic license with a technical support question. (The Softimage manuals say that academics should only contact the academic reseller for technical assistance.) Well, technical support at Softimage did, indeed, respond promptly and in a very helpful manner. So in future I'll be sure to request assistance from the folks at Softimage first -- it seems that there are, indeed, better options than either the "we'll get back to you" folks at JourneyEd or imposing upon the instructors and professionals on the Highend message board.

Anyway, your help was greatly appreciated!

--Michael H. Crawford
Department of Anthropology
University of Kansas

[wolfinger]

teanau - have you considered using "server install" instread of installing once and ghosting images? I would think that would reduce maintenance overhead (perhaps not the first time, but once you upgrade it next time).

[pnoizat2]

mmm i saw that option, (server install)
and yes i may still end up going that way, ghosting feels a little bit "crunchy" for my liking.

Problem is im not the IT manager (I just specified the software) so I dont want to have to rely o my network experise to get the software/ render farm running on time.

just out of curiosity,
Has anyone had a trouble free network install?