SAS License Renewal

[titan31]

Hi,

I know this has been asked a few times before and there's a bunch of documentation out there, but it's my first time so I just want to make certain I'm doing the SAS renewals correctly.

We've got our new licenses off SAS and all look fine, but I'm a bit unsure on where to run them in. We've got 3 servers, and 3 licenses for them (VA, Compute and Metadata), so do I go on to each server and run the Renew SAS Software utility and place the VA license to VA Server etc, or do I just run it once (from any of the servers, or my own pc) ?

When I do renew the licenses, do I need to go to everyone's PC who has SAS and renew their licenses locally, or once it's updated on the servers, is that fine? 

We've got 5 license files off SAS, 3 for Servers, 1 that is Wrkstn which looks like it's just for DataFlux and then 1 that is Wrkstn_Srv which seems to be for EMiner. What am I to with that Wrkstn_Srv one? 

I also see that the SAS documentation references a SID File. How do I differentiate that from the normal renewal file?

I know it's a good few questions, but any help is appreciated

Thanks

[SASKiwi · Accepted solution]

What SAS version do you have? Up to SAS 9.4M2, you use the SAS Software Renewal Utility to apply licences. From SAS 9.4M3 you use the SAS Deployment Manager.

SAS server licences are only applied directly on the server(s) they are for if they contain the servers' names. You need to not only apply the licence, you also need to update the SID file in metadata. SID (Site Installation Data) and licence renewal file are the same thing. SAS docs / software have a tendency to use this type of jargon which I agree is confusing to new SAS users. You do this from SAS Deployment Manager.

I assume you are using Enterprise Guide with your SAS servers. There is no separate licence for this. The Dataflux workstation licence needs to be applied to all workstations that have SAS Data Quality Studio installed.

[titan31]

Perfect,

Thank you. We've got 9.4M3 so it'll be the deployment manager for us then. I see the options for Renew SAS Software in Deployment Manager and Update SID File in Metadata so I assume I just do the two of those per server, and that would be it that I need to do. We'd have Enterprise Guide alright so I don't need to install that license (EMiner one references that in the ProdNum), so I just do the 3 servers + the local pcs that have DataFlux and think that would be it.

Thanks

[jklaverstijn]

Just in case, if you use a SAS supplied instance of LSF for scheduling, than that would require it's own license update as well.

But then again, you may not have LSF running.

Regards,
-- Jan.

[SASKiwi]

@titan31 Great - if you think your post has been successfully answered then please mark it as such. Happy licensing!

[titan31]

Hi,

Just a follow up question on this, when you're renewing the file, do you need to stop services before you start renewing and then restart them after done, or do you turn off services on all and reboot after you're done, or just do nothing and apply them?

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks,

[jklaverstijn]

Depends on your installation. But you never need to stop your services before renewing a license. A restart afterwards is required for LSF and the ever-running SAS services like metadata server and middle tier. Not sure about the spawners though. Don't think they check the license but not sure about that one. Maybe better be safe than sorry.

A reboot, in my book, is a last resort attempt that defies most systems management best practices and will rarely, if ever, be required in routine SAS administration tasks. The additional downtime involved will not make you popular with your users. In general I'm not a fan of trigger happy administrators 😉 .

Regards,

-- Jan.

[titan31]

I'd be applying licenses to Metadata, Mid Tier and Compute servers, so I'd assume I'd need reboots in all 3 of them after I'm done it. The admin guide for license renewal says If any SAS servers or SAS Spawners are running on the machine, stop them before you start the
Renew SAS Software 9.4 utility (I'm Windows incase that makes a difference), so wasn't sure if I needed to do it or not, as applying a license doesn't seem like something you should need to reboot for. 

[SASKiwi]

While the instructions say to stop SAS servers etc, I've never bothered doing so. The licences will still apply successfully without stopping everything. I've never found any issues with this.

Having said that, our environment is pretty vanilla. SAS Analytics Pro aka BI Server, Enterprise Miner plus a few add-on products. I can't guarantee that there are other SAS products where stopping and starting is actually necessary.

Our SAS servers get stopped and restarted at least once a month anyway as part of regular maintenance so any propagation of license data is going to happen as a matter of course anyway.  

[titan31]

We've Visual Analytics so probably going to lean on caution and do the stopping of services and reboot after licenses are applied. Doing our regular Windows patching at same time aswell so have to do reboot for that anyway. 

For the sid files, as that part is kind of confusing me, do I just update that on the metadata server (so only when remoted on to that server), or am I applying that on all 3 servers and it's just updating metadata. I have the option to do it on all 3 servers (it's not greyed out in Deployment manager) so do I do that, or is it that I just go into the metadata server and apply all 3 files to that?

Sorry, for all the questions, first time doing this and no test environment to try it on

[SASKiwi]

If you have 3 licences, one for each SAS server then they need to applied on each of the three servers as specified in the licence text using the SAS Deployment Manager. Once this is done (they can be done in any order) then on the metadata server use the SDM to load the SID File into metadata.

You can then check if this is successful by using SAS Management Console's Metadata Manager  - View licence data option. Also in any SAS session you can run this code - proc setinit; run; - to check it has been applied correctly to the Application server.  

[titan31]

Perfect,

Wasn't sure whether I needed to apply the sid files to each server individually and then all to Metadata or just apply all to Metadata? Hopefully it all goes well

[SASKiwi]

The metadata licence gets applied to the metadata server, then you do the upload SID file to metadata on the metadata server only. You don't need to do it again on the other servers.