Installation Checklist

New license server

Follow these steps if you do not re-use an already existing license server.

• Create the license server in the My Hex-Rays portal. See: Add servers

• Activate your floating license and assign it to the new license server. See: Floating license activation

Download the required files

• Have the license server license and certificate bundle issued for this deployment ready.

• In the Download Center, select the appropriate release channel, open ida-license-server, choose the release, and download the Linux x64 or arm64 archive. Download IDA separately if needed.

Installation

• Unzip the download. It contains one folder with the server, the admin client and a README.

• Decide how it will run, because it decides where the folder goes:

  • to try it out or run it yourself, anywhere will do;

  • for a system service that starts at boot, put it where the service account can read it.

    >sudo mv license-<version>-<target> /opt/license-server
    >cd /opt/license-server

• Run setup, giving it the two files you downloaded:

    >sudo ./license-server setup --defaults \
       --license <your-license>.hexlic \
       --cert-bundle <your-bundle>.zip

• Save the administrator password from the closing summary. It is shown once and never written to a log. If it is lost: ./license-server admin reset-password.

• Check the server is up:

    # installed as a service
    >sudo ./license-server service status

    # running it yourself
    >./license-server start

• Check it answers on the admin port (8080 unless you changed it):

    >curl http://<host>:8080/api/health

• Check your licenses are being served, with their seat counts:

    >./license-client -h <host>:65434 list

• Sign in to the administration console at http://<host>:8080/admin with the account setup created.

If you run into any issues, refer to the troubleshooting section of the documentation.

Existing license server

• Activate your floating license and assign it to an existing license server. See: Floating license activation

• Download the regenerated license bundle issued for the existing server.

• Place it beside the current one in the deployment's data/licenses/ directory and restart the server. A bundle that passes cleanly takes precedence over one that only passes with warnings, so the old file does not have to be removed first.

• Confirm the new seats with ./license-client -h <host>:65434 list, or on the console's Licenses page.

Migrating an existing deployment

• Back up the existing deployment.

• Stop and disable the old server — setup refuses while it is running, still enabled, or answering on its RPC port:

    >sudo systemctl stop hexlicsrv
    >sudo systemctl disable hexlicsrv

• Put the new folder somewhere the service account can read — not the old install's directory, which has to stay as it is until the migration has read it.

• Run setup. Interactively it asks whether you are migrating as its first question; --from-legacy answers it up front:

    >sudo ./license-server setup --from-legacy /opt/hexlicsrv

• Read the summary. It names everything carried across, everything that could not be, and the access rules whose meaning changes.

• Review data/config/acl.yml before serving.

• Keep the old install in place until you are satisfied: it is untouched, and it is the way back.