License keeps reverting to Developer Edition

[rowann]

We have a server that keeps reverting to Developer Edition every night after restart.

We have several instances installed and it only happens to this machine.

I have already tried to enter the license from the CFIDE under information and verified the License key is the same with our other installations which is a valid key.

I also checked the file permissions and ownership of the license.properties file is the same as the other installations.

I've googled and found several cases of this but Adobe hasn't seem to have posted an answer anywhere.

Can someone please help?

[Adam Cameron.]

You don't have anything running on the server itself which is attempting to maintain some sort of system integrity or anything like that which might be rolling-back changes to a "known good" configuration?

After the licence is reverted, what's the last modified timestamp?  Is it always the same every night?  What system tasks - if any - are set to run at this time?

--

Adam

[rowann]

Nothing, really. Our configuration on this machine is fairly similar to others.

I tried to manually restart just now and on the logs this is what I get:

Starting Macromedia JRun 4.0 (Build 108673), coldfusion server

07/09 10:10:44 warning Invalid license; reverting to Developer Version

[rowann]

To add more information:

I entered the license again in CFIDE under System Information, this changed the timestamp of the license.properties file to:

07/09 10:46:03

On the logs it says:

07/09 10:46:03 Information [jrpp-12] - Enterprise Edition enabled

Then I manually do a restart:

/usr/cfusion8/bin/coldfusion restart

On cfserver.log I find:

Starting Macromedia JRun 4.0 (Build 108673), coldfusion server

07/09 10:49:54 warning Invalid license; reverting to Developer Version

Seems like the restart is wiping it out.

In addition, to answer your question, license.properties last modified timestamp is:

Jul 9 10:49

[Adam Cameron.]

Ah, that sux.

I dunno what to suggest.  You could try contacting Adobe but they'll probably be less interested than they usuall are (which is to say: not really at all, as far as I can tell) in supporting you with a CF8 install.  It's a bit long in the tooth now.

TBH, in you position I'd probably throw my hands up in despair (for the melodrama), and then deinstall CF and reinstall.  It only takes 15min or so, which is perhaps a better use of your time than trying to work out WTF.

That said, I'm particularly impatient with this sort of problem, so I reach this point faster than a lot of people might.  I'm just not interested in server admin beyond what's absolutely necessary, really, I guess.

--

Adam

[carl type3]

What happens to the ColdFusion8\lib\license.properties file upon working OK and reverting to dev edition?

Regards, Carl.

[rowann]

File contents actually look exactly the same before and after it reverts to Developer edition.

Only the timestamp changes.

[carl type3]

license.properties has some values for sn= & not reverting to sn= blank?

Pardon me reading thru thread start to finish I gather license.properties does have sn= valid detail.

[rowann]

Hi Carl, yeah that's the odd thing. The sn value in the license.properties file is not wiped out.

The contents of license.properties file is still in tact.

When this has happened on a prior install in our test server, usually the license.properties file loses the serial number in the file.

But this one is quite odd because the file looks exactly the same.

[carl type3]

Hi Rowan, I have not been on U/Li Nix for a long time. Still chmod 777 comes to mind. Don’t know perhaps the demon who runs CF ‘init’ can not correctly touch file tho you say the date stamp increments.

For what it is worth on Windows, I set license.properties to permissions that CF8 application service user account could not see, while CF starts and runs the coldfusion-out.log says:

Starting Macromedia JRun 4.0 (Build 108673), coldfusion server

10/07 17:19:51 warning Unable to open D:\ColdFusion8\runtime/lib/license.properties

And I get a whole lot of 500 errors running CFM pages. So not the same thing tho if a chmod 777 is ‘cheap’ thing to try well why not.

HTH, Carl.

[rowann]

Finally found the answer:

http://old.nabble.com/CF-production-server-td4534775.html

The issue was that prior, we were getting a warning "warning Unable to open /usr/cfusion8/runtime/lib/license.properties"

We thought this needed the license.properties file in /usr/cfusion8/lib to also live in that path.

Aparrently, this is a JRun license error and not a CF license error.

So everytime CF loaded, it reverted back.

We simply removed the file and now, everything is working again!