Post-installation: Generating the license file

After installing the HCL Local License Server (LLS), you must create deployments in My HCLSoftware (MHS) to manage your entitlements. Each deployment generates a license file that must be copied to the licenses folder on your LLS host machine.

Procedure

  1. Create a deployment and allocate licenses.
    1. Log in to My HCLSoftware (MHS).
    2. Go to the Deployments page.

      On your first login, the page is empty and displays only the Add Deployment card.

    3. Click Add Deployment to create a new deployment.
    4. Provide the following details:

      • Deployment Name: type a meaningful name for your deployment.

      • Deployment Type: select the deployment type.

      • Fingerprint: add the fingerprint generated during installation. It is displayed in the console and saved in the installer.txt file.

        Copy the full fingerprint string including its prefix. The prefix depends on the deployment method:

        • Native installation: v3.lls.hash
        • Docker deployment: v3.lls.uid.hash
    5. Click Add Deployment.

      A list of all your purchased license entitlements is displayed.

    6. Enter the number of licenses you want to assign to the new deployment.

      The availability count updates automatically when you modify the license allocation.

    7. Click Save.
      A new card for your deployment appears on the Deployments page.
  2. Activate the license server and download the license file.
    1. Click the options button of the deployment you created in the previous step.
    2. Select Activate License Server.

      The Activate License Server window is displayed.

    3. Select Local as the license server type.
    4. Click Activate License Server.
    5. Enter the fingerprint that you copied earlier.
    6. Click Save and Download to generate and download the license file.
    7. Copy the downloaded license file to the licenses folder in the LLS installation directory.

      The licenses folder is <lls_install_directory>/licenses, where <lls_install_directory> is the directory specified during installation.

Results

You have generated a license file and copied it to the host machine.

LLS detects and loads new license files automatically. A restart is not required.

All license updates are logged in <lls_install_directory>/logs/hcl_lls_features.log.

Important:

On a Docker deployment, the container runs as a non-root user and cannot change file permissions. If a license file is copied into the licenses folder by a different user or process, the container might not be able to read it, and hcl_lls.log reports a permission error. On Linux, make the file readable:

chmod 644 licenses/*.license

On VirtualBox shared folders and SMB or CIFS mounts, chmod has no effect because permissions are fixed when the file system is mounted. Set them in the mount options instead, for example fmode=644 for VirtualBox or file_mode=0644 for CIFS.

On a native installation on Linux, the service runs as the user account you supplied during installation, and that account is given ownership of the licenses folder. A license file added later keeps the ownership of whoever copied it, so if the service cannot read it, either make the file readable with chmod 644 or transfer ownership to the service account with chown.

On Windows, the service runs under the NT AUTHORITY\LocalService account. If the service cannot read a license file, grant that account read access to the licenses folder.