If you are using a single-use or floating license, you will need to choose a machine to act as your Gurobi token server. This token server doles out tokens to client machines. A client will request a token from the token server when it creates a Gurobi environment, and it will return the token when it destroys that environment. For a single-use license, the client and the token server must be the same machine. For a floating license, the client machine can be any machine that can reach the token server over your network (including the token server itself). The client can run any supported operating system. Thus, for example, a Linux client can request tokens from a Windows token server.
Once you've chosen a machine to act as your token server, you'll need
to run the grbgetkey
command on that machine to retrieve your
Gurobi license key. Note that the machine must be connected to the
Internet in order to run this command. An Internet connection is not
required after you have obtained your license key.
If your computer isn't connected to the Internet, we also offer a manual license key process. You'll find manual instructions at the bottom of the License Detail page (by following the link labeled click here for additional instructions).
The exact command to run for a specific license is indicated at the
bottom of the License Detail page (e.g., grbgetkey 253e22f3-...
). We
recommend that you use copy-paste to copy the entire grbgetkey
command from our website and paste it directly into the Windows
Search box (and then hit Enter):
The grbgetkey
program passes identifying information about
your machine back to our website, and the website responds with your
license key. Once this exchange has occurred, grbgetkey
will
ask for the name of the directory in which to store your license
key file (gurobi.lic
). You should see a prompt that looks
like this:
You can store the license key file anywhere, but we strongly recommend that you accept the default location by hitting Enter. Setting up a non-default location is error-prone and a frequent source of trouble.
Using a non-default license file location
The Windows token server will look for the gurobi.lic
key file
in two different default locations: c:\gurobi
and
c:\gurobi600
(for Gurobi 6.0.0). Note that these default paths
are absolute, so for example Gurobi will look for the license key file
in c:\gurobi
, even if the software is installed in
d:\gurobi
. Note that the token server won't look for the
license file in your home directory (it runs under username
LocalService, so it doesn't have access to your home
directory).
If you would like to use a non-default license key file location, you
can do so by setting system environment variable
GRB_LICENSE_FILE
to point to the license key file. Important note: the environment variable should point to the license
key file itself, not to the directory that contains the file.
On Windows systems, environment variables are created and modified
through the Control Panel. Searching for Environment Variables
from the Control Panel search box will lead you to the
appropriate screen. You will need to add a new System variable
named GRB_LICENSE_FILE
, and set it to the
location of your license file (e.g., d:\gurobi\gurobi.lic
).
Important note: your new environment variable must be a System variable, not a User variable.
Once you have followed the steps above and have obtained a license key file, your next step is to start the token server.