Does animBot need a constant connection to the floating license server?

This page has moved to https://help.animbot.ca/support/solutions/articles/61000292057-roam-licenses

 

Yes and no.

By default, animBot needs a fairly reliable connection to the license server. When user launches animBot, it will try to check out a license from the server, if the server is not available, it will error out and the app won’t launch. If animBot successfully checked out a license at launch, it will still need to communicate to the license server, roughly every two minutes. That constant connection is to allow the full power of using floating licenses, so that once a user is done with it, the license can be used by someone else.

If the user has a spotty network connection that might fail to communicate to the server for periods longer than 2 minutes, roam licenses can be a good solution. In a nutshell, when roaming is enabled, the server will checkout and reserve that license to the user for up to 7 days. That means, after the initial successful check out, the user can stay offline for up to 7 days. During that period, every time a connection to the server is reestablished, the roaming license period will be renewed for another period up to 7 days. It’s good to note that, because the license will be reserved to the user, it will only return to the license server pool when either the 7 days without connection has passed or if user returns the license earlier (more on that below).

How to Setup Roaming

1) First of all, you will need a roaming license. Please contact me at alan@animbot.ca.

2) Different than other animBot RLM license(s) you have, the roaming license needs to be installed on the local client machine (the user). The user can copy it anywhere in the computer, here is one example:

C:\Users\Peter\Documents\maya\scripts\animBot_Enterprise_Edition_roam.lic

3) The user needs to set 2 environment variables before launching animBot. A simple way to do it, is to launch animBot with this python command:

import os
os.environ["RLM_ROAM"] = "7"
os.environ["animbot_LICENSE"] = "C:/Users/Peter/Documents/maya/scripts"
import animBot
animBot.toggle()

Note above that you need to specify the amount of roaming days, up to 7 days max as well as the location where the RLM roam license was installed. Windows users: do not use inverted backslash “\”.

4) Last thing, user will need to install animBot itself locally. Please read this topic for more details.

 

Optional

By default, the max roam days is set to 7. Users can set any number of days up to that maximum amount individually, like the example #3 above. However, if you wish to set a different maximum amount (up to 7 days), for example 2 days, you can add MAX_ROAM_COUNT = 2 to the animbot.opt file (this is a simple text file, located in the same directory that you’ve installed animbot.set file). That way, even if the user set it to 7, the new value will be reinforced.

If you wish to reserve the license only for the day, set RLM_ROAM = “today”, and the license will be returned to the pool at midnight.

 

Returning a license earlier

Sometimes it is desirable to return the license earlier than the initial 7 days which it was reserved for. User will need to be connected to the server.

1) Close all Maya sessions and launch a fresh one. Launch animBot by running the python command below. This will make sure that the license checked out is not a roam license anymore.

import os
os.environ["RLM_ROAM"] = "-1"
import animBot
animBot.toggle()

2) Close Maya. This will return the license to the server.