VIAVI TestCenter: Why port reservation is failing even though one server is up (either primary or backup License Server), but the other License server is down?

VIAVI TestCenter: STC 5.38 - Why port reservation is failing even though one server is up (either primary or backup License Server), but the other License server is down?

  • During that time (5.38 to 5.48) we were told this was this way working as designed:   All license servers must be up at the moment of the first port reservation. Generally speaking, the process is as follows: During the port reservation STC tries to download the license server version file from the primary and backup license servers (scp is used on Linux), If any of the download fails, the port reservation fails. The version file is critical since the licenses STC checks out are dependent on the version of the license server, so STC tries to download the version file but if the attempts fail, the whole reservation operation is marked as failed.   Be aware this is just during the first ports reservation, after this is not needed both servers are up, this is: once STC has both version files, the hot_standby configuration comes into play and if any of both servers goes down, the server that remains up serves the licenses, even a new reservation will not re-download the version file and this behavior won’t be seen if a new ports got reserved and added into the configuration   The explanation about why STC attempts to download the version information from all configured virtual license servers when the first virtual port is reserved is as follows:   • STC must be able to determine the version of all configured virtual license servers to know which entitlements to check out when a virtual port is reserved. The reasons for this are two-fold The required entitlements for virtual ports were changed when virtual license server version 4.0.0 was released in 2017. STC can connect to all versions of virtual license servers, but it needs to know the license server version to know which entitlement(s) to check out.STC does not support mixing of virtual license server versions. If multiple virtual license servers are configured, they all must have versions numbers = 4.0.0. If there are mixed versions where the version of one of more are = 4.0.0, STC will throw an exception when the first virtual port is reserved. It is considered ok if one virtual license server was 3.1 and the backup was 3.1.1 or if the primary was 4.0.0 and the backup was 4.1.0. For example, if the primary virtual license server was 4.1.0 and the backup was 3.1.1 and STC checked out entitlements for the first two ports in a test, it would check out entitlements consistent with a license server whose version >= 4.0.0. However, if the primary failed and the backup took over, the backup would not have the same entitlements as the primary because the version of the backup is * Prior to the change made (in 5.38), the download could fail, but the reservation could succeed. This was considered a problem because STC needs to ensure license server versions are not mixed.     • Starting in 5.49 it seems the behavior has changed again (as part of CIPCD-19126 fix) and it is working back the way it was before 5.38, this is:  • In the case of two primary servers: • If one is down or powered off due to some issues, the other one can be used for pulling the licenses, the user has to configure or add two primary servers only under the primary column given in STC GUI: Tools->License Management->Virtual Licensing Configuration. • In the case of primary and backup servers: • Both should be configured properly, backup server must have backup entitlements having licenses containing HOT_STANDBY_BACKUP, so that the server should be recognized as backup and show backup mode enabled status. Use bserver command to configure backup via the primary server. After that, if the primary is down or not available, backup will be used to pull licenses. Note: Add primary and backup servers in respective columns given under STC GUI: Tools->License Management->Virtual Licensing Configuration.If both server do not contain version information, we will use new license server (4.0 or greater) for license checkout.