How do I configure an AWS EC2 instance so the license file remains valid?

A Gurobi license file set up on an AWS EC2 instance will remain valid if the EC2 instance is stopped and restarted. However, a Gurobi license file may become invalid after the EC2 instance is terminated unless some additional configuration steps are taken.

Gurobi license files are tied to specific hardware and software components of the host machine. These components normally change when EC2 instances are terminated and relaunched.

For Linux instances

On Linux, a Gurobi license file depends on the primary network interface, which may change when starting a new AWS EC2 instance. To prevent this, assign an Elastic Network Interface (ENI) to the EC2 instance and bind the Gurobi license to this new network adapter. With an ENI, the license file will continue to work, since the network interface persists for the machine running Gurobi.

Assigning a license file to the primary ENI

To assign a Gurobi license file to an ENI attached as the primary network interface, perform the following steps:

1. Create a new ENI.
2. Attach the ENI to your EC2 instance, assigning the ENI as the primary network adapter.
3. Start your EC2 instance.
4. Log in to your account on the Gurobi website and navigate to Downloads & Licenses->Your Gurobi Licenses. Click the appropriate license ID, then follow the instructions to download the license file onto the EC2 instance using grbgetkey.

Assigning a license key to a secondary ENI

Assigning a Gurobi license file to an ENI attached as a secondary network interface is a more complicated process because by default grbgetkey only considers the primary network interface. It can be done by performing the following steps:

1. Create a new ENI.
2. Attach the ENI to your AWS EC2 instance, assigning the ENI as the secondary network adapter.
3. Start your AWS EC2 instance.
4. Determine the required machine information:
   • run grbprobe adapters to list all available network interfaces
   • run grbprobe --adapter <eni> --output probe.txt replacing <eni> with the name of your ENI adapter from the previous command.
5. run grbgetkey --input probe.txt to generate the license information based on the previously stored machine information.

In case you cannot run grbgetkey because you cannot reach the Gurobi license server from the AWS machine, you need to enter the information collected in the probe.txt file manually:

1. Log in to your account on the Gurobi website and navigate to Downloads & Licenses->Your Gurobi Licenses. Find the appropriate license ID, then click Install -> Generate Manually. This will open the form below, which you must complete with the information collected in the probe.txt file.
   
2. Once you have filled in the form, click on Submit, download the license file and copy it to the EC2 machine.