ISV-defined Hostid Processing

RLM provides the ability to extend the native set of hostids by using your own routines to obtain host identification which is unique to you. There are 2 methods to do this – the older, deprecated “isv-defined hostid”, and the newer “ISV=” hostid type.

If you use the deprecated isv-defined hostid:

  • You cannot use a ISV server settings file, instead, you must ship a binary, which means your customers cannot get bug fixes with a new generic RLM server.

  • Your customers cannot use the generic rlmhostid tool, you must write and ship your own tool.

  • You cannot use the standard Activation Pro license generator; you must build a custom generator - which may involve licensing an additional RLM platform.

  • You cannot use RLM Cloud servers.

Reprise Software recommends using the ISV= hostid type, which uses the ISV-defined string as set by the rlm_set_environ() call.

The advantages and disadvantages of doing this, over the older ISV-defined hostid code are:

Advantages:

  • No custom code to write (other than getting the string itself).

  • You can use an ISV server settings file and avoid building an ISV server.

  • You can use an Activation Pro generator settings file and avoid building a custom generator.

  • You can use RLM Cloud to provide cloud-based license servers to your customers.

Disadvantages (compared to the old isv-defined hostid):

  • Only one hostid of this type is supported on a system.

  • The hostid comparison code is always a case-insensitive strcmp() function.

  • This hostid can’t be used for the license server itself, only for node-locked licenses.

To use this hostid type, do the following:

  1. Determine the hostid on your system (in your application).

  2. Call rlm_set_environ(….., your-hostid), immediately after your call to rlm_init()

  3. Use “isv=your-hostid”, as the hostid for your license.

Note

This hostid can’t be used for the license server itself.

If after reading this you still want to write code to create an isv-defined hostid, please contact Reprise Software.