Error 96 when using MATLAB on VPN network: Linux

I installed MATLAB on my laptop yesterday (Ubuntu 16.04).

I'm on an academic licence, so I need to be connected to my university network. I set it up yesterday on campus connected to their wifi and MATLAB was running fine after I installed it.

However today I have tried to open matlab in the same way I opened it on campus. The difference this time is I am not on campus and I am connected to their network via VPN.

I get the error:

License checkout failed.
License Manager Error -96
MATLAB is unable to connect to the license server. 
 Make sure that the MATLAB client machine can communicate with the hostname listed in the SERVER line
of the license file, and that the port listed in the SERVER line is not blocked by a firewall.

Troubleshoot this issue by visiting: 
http://www.mathworks.com/support/lme/R2016b/96

Diagnostic Information:
Feature: MATLAB 
 License path: /home/<username/.matlab/R2016b_licenses:/home/<username/Matlab/licenses/license.dat:/home/<username>/Matlab
/licenses/network.lic 
 Licensing error: -96,7. System Error: 2

I'd like to add that I checked the VPN connection and it said the connection was established. Since MATLAB won't run on any device not connected to the network, there must be something (firewall maybe?) blocking this.

Answer 1

[Maitiumc]

Ok so I entered the ping command, worked fine, Then I entered a netcat command and this also succeeded. I launched matlab again and it opened.

The commands were:

ping -c10 'server address from the "SERVER" line in the licence file'

netcat -vz 'server address from the "SERVER" line in the licence file' xxxxx

the xxxxx is a number that was in the server line also, there was a code before it, but that wasn't needed in the netcat command. Chances are your licence file's server line will be a different format, but mine was as follows: SERVER licsrvname.uni.ac.uk 00000000000Y xxxxx

so my netcat command was

netcat -vz licsrvname.uni.ac.uk xxxxx

for info on netcat command

Answer 2

[Sruthi Geetha]

This error message usually indicates that there is a problem resolving the hostname of the license manager machine. The license server's hostname must be resolvable for MATLAB to connect to it. To test this, we need to use the ping application, which is a command line utility:

Press Ctrl Alt T on the keyboard. If you prefer, there should be something called Terminal in your programs menu. You can search for it by pressing "Windows" key and typing "terminal". Remember, commands in Linux are case sensitive (so upper- or lower-case letters matter).

After launching the command line interface, enter this command:

ping hostname

where hostname is the hostname of the license server as it appears on the SERVER line of your license file.

For version R2008a or later, the license file is named network.lic and is found under $MATLAB/licenses.

For versions prior to R2008a, the license file named license.dat and is located in either:

$MATLAB\bin\{win32|win64} (For Windows) $MATLAB/etc (For all other operating systems)

where $MATLAB is your root MATLAB installation directory.

If the output of the above command comes back as 'unreachable' or 'unresolvable', then contact your System Administrator and have them address this issue. Alternatively, if you are unable to resolve the hostname of the license server, but can ping the IP Address of the license server, you can replace hostname in the SERVER line of your local license with the IP Address of the license server. To do so:

1. Navigate to $MATLAB/licenses on your machine. 2. Open network.lic with WordPad (Windows) or TextEdit (Mac). Do not open the file with Notepad. 3. In the SERVER line, the second item is the hostname. Replace this with the IP address. 4. Save the file and launch MATLAB to test if MATLAB was able to connect to the license server.

NOTE: If your license server does not have a static IP, then this workaround will stop working when the DHCP lease is updated. You should contact your license administrator to try and resolve the issue with hostname resolution if your license server does not have a static IP.

If MATLAB is still unable to connect to the license server even though you can ping it successfully, there may be one or more firewalls blocking the connection between the MATLAB client and the MATLAB license server. The license manager communicates on two ports that must be opened through the firewall(s). If there is a firewall running, contact your System Administrator to open the necessary ports in the firewall.

For more information about the port the license manager uses, see the following Article:

What ports does the MATLAB license manager use, and how can I set those ports? http://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/answers/96756

For more information about checking your ports, see the Article:

How can I check if the ports between license manager and client are blocked? http://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/answers/91735