Abaqus License Check Command

17-09-2021
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F.2.10 Do I have to update the network license server when I install a new release of Abaqus?

Yes, if the new release of Abaqus uses a later version of FLEXnet Licensing than your existing license server. The Abaqus 6.9 Extended Functionality release uses FLEXnet Licensing Version 10.8.7. Abaqus 6.9 also used FLEXnet Licensing Version 10.8.7; therefore, you do not have to update a license server that was installed with Abaqus 6.9. If you have a version of FLEXnet Licensing earlier than Version 10.8.7 installed on your system, you should use the licensing installation procedure to automatically upgrade the license server; you must upgrade a license server that was installed with a previous Abaqus release. If you have an existing license server that uses a version of FLEXnet Licensing higher than Version 10.8.7, you should use the procedure described in “Updating an Abaqus license file,” Section 3.2, to update your license file without overwriting the existing license server. For more information, see “Licensing installation procedure,” Section 2.1.2. If your Abaqus license file is integrated with FLEXnet license files for other products using a combined license file, you must ensure that the lmgrd version meets the FLEXnet version compatibility rules (listed in Appendix I of the FLEXnet Licensing End User Guide Version 10.8).

You can check under Licensing on the Support page at www.simulia.com for the FLEXnet Licensing End User Guide and to see if a maintenance delivery includes a later version of FLEXnet Licensing.

Abaqus License Check Command Line

A minimum of 5 analysis tokens is required to run a model on a single CPU-core. Increasing the CPU-cores can reduce the computational time but the job will need more tokens. The Abaqus Token Calculator (also known as the Abaqus license calculator) on the right will determine how many tokens are required. This limits the amount of time lmstat spends attempting to connect to server. Note: The lmstat -a command is a potentially expensive command. With many active users, this command generates a lot of network activity. The lmremove tool requires the output of the lmstat -a command, as shown in the example below. The output for the command. Abaqus suite components wait for a license to free before they proceed, which results in the batch job waiting, while occupying the compute nodes. Please see the following webpage for the current license usage. Abaqus uses a non-linear task vs. License count checked out model, which is as follows. In the black screen that appears, commands can be entered. They are then executed in the current directory, which is shown on the line (Figure 3). In this case, we will enter abaqus cae as command and press ‘enter’. We then get the feedback that licenses are checked out, and Abaqus/CAE is started.

Coming from Windows

If you are a windows user then you'll need a ssh client like 'putty' to have access to your remote server over ssh and a file transfer client such as 'FileZilla' for transferring large files across machines conveniently.

Once you have access to your remote server you need to be familiar with some basic unix commands to be able to makeuse of abaqus via the command line.

Server addresses at iitk: (Internal use only)

The following link lists the various servers available in computer center at iitk campus:

Basic Linux Commands

pwd

short for 'present working directory', this command displays the full path to the directory you are currently working in. It helps you make sense of your location on the server.

cd

To navigate to a directory

To navigate out of a directory one level up, use cd ..

mkdir

Command

To create a new directory

rm

To delete a file/directory.

Abaqus License Check Command List

man

To display any command manual/help. Lists available options for that particular command.

top

A task manager to display list of running processes. You can stop/kill unresponsive commands from here, get an overview of consumed system resources, etc. To exit use q.

bash

Some remote servers do not display the bash prompt by default which often leads to some keys not working, keys behaving unexpectedly. If that happens you may run bash from your current shell to start a bash shell.

nano

A lightweight text viewer/editor. To exit use ctrl + x.

Abaqus License Check Command

vi/vim

An advanced text editor which offers additional options from nano. Meant for advanced users only. To exit use :q.

Abaqus License Check Command

Miscellaneous Tips

  • Ctrl+C, Ctrl+Z are your friends when it comes to unresponsive programs at the terminal.
  • Use the Up and Down keys at the terminal to go through your command history. Saves you from retyping the entire line again and again.
  • at bash prompt you can use Ctrl+R to search through your command history.
  • Use the Tab key to auto-complete commands and file-names.

Job submission

Abaqus license status command

Oncce you have copied your input file, user subroutine file (if any) over to the remote server directory using filezilla, the following command can be used to submit a job remotely.

abaqus job=<jobname> inp=<input filename>

If your analysis requires a subroutine,

abaqus job=<jobname> user=<subroutine filename> inp=<input filename>

where the values within <> can be of your choice.

To monitor the progress of your analysis job, you can display the content of .sta file using nano. however this does not update the status file as it progresses. To dynamically display the progress, you may use the tail command:

tail -f <jobname>.sta

If for some reason you need to kill your running jobs, you can either use top to kill the relebvant process or use killall <process name> to end the proceess.

The process name can be found from the top command.

After the pre-processing,analysis is finished you will end up with your odb file in your working directory. You can then copy it over to your machine using filezilla.

Remote access via Abaqus GUI

ABAQUS has support for submitting a job on a remote server and accessing the odb file remotely. In this case the data will reside on the remote computer. This is a good way to do the modelling on your personal computer and do the heavy computational work on a remote HPC machine.

There are two main steps involved in setting up remote access, namely network odb connector and remote job submission. We will take a look at both of them individually.

Network ODB Connector

Pre-requisites

  1. Both the host and remote should be running on linux.
  2. The login username should be identical on both machines.
  3. Password-less ssh login should be setup on remote server. The procedure is described here.

Steps

  1. Go to the network odb connector manager from the file menu.

  2. Create a new connection by clicking on Create...

  3. Fill up the details of host name and directory where files are located. In the Advanced tab, choose ssh, automatically start the server. In the remote ABAQUS execution procedure provide the full location of abaqus executable, for example /usr/local/softs/Abaqus2017/DassaultSystemes/SIMULIA/Commands/abaqus. Choose a lower time-out of 1-2 minutes.

  4. Click on start to start server.

  5. TO connect to remote directory, click open and browse to the Network Connections. Here you should find your remote directory.

Remote job submission to remote queue.

Abaqus License Status Command

Pre-requisites

Abaqus License Check Command Center

  1. The environment file on the host computer should have the ques and server address defined. e.g.

  2. The environment file on remote computer should also have queue class definition as below.

    This is merely an example, the parameters would change according to how you would like to submit your job.

    Remember that queueName should be identical on both machines. The local machine would show name as submission queue but the job would be submitted to the queue named myqueue.

  3. While submitting the job make sure to choose remote queue in job submission dialogue box.