Cisco Smart Licensing

Introduction

Cisco Smart Licensing is a cloud-based approach to licensing and it simplifies purchase, deployment and management of Cisco software assets. Entitlements are purchased through a Cisco account via Cisco Commerce Workspace (CCW) and are immediately deposited into a Smart Account for usage. This eliminates the need to install license files on every device. Products that are smart enabled communicate directly to Cisco to report consumption.

Cisco Smart Software Manager (CSSM) enables the management of software licenses and Smart Account from a single portal. The interface allows you to activate your product, manage entitlements, renew and upgrade software.

A functioning Smart Account is required to complete the registration process. For detailed information about CSSM, see Cisco Smart Software Manager.

Smart Accounts and Virtual Accounts

A Virtual Account exists as a sub-account within the Smart Account. Virtual Accounts are a customer defined structure based on organizational layout, business function, geography or any defined hierarchy. They are created and maintained by the Smart Account administrator(s).

Visit Cisco Cisco Software Central to learn about how to create and manage Smart Accounts.

Request a Smart Account

The creation of a new Smart Account is a one-time event and subsequent management of users is a capability provided through the tool. To request a Smart Account, visit Cisco Cisco Software Central and take the following steps:

After logging in select Request a Smart Account in the Administration section:
Select the type of Smart Account to create. There are two options: (a) Individual Smart Account requiring agreement to represent your company. By creating this Smart Account you agree to authorization to create and manage product and service entitlements, users and roles on behalf of your organization. (b) Create the account on behalf of someone else.
Provide the required domain identifier and the preferred account name:
The account request will be pending an approval of the Account Domain Identifier. A subsequent email will be sent to the requester to complete the setup process:

Adding users to a Smart Account

Smart Account user management is available in the Administration section of Cisco Cisco Software Central. Take the following steps to add a new user to a Smart Account:

After logging in Select "Manage Smart Account" in the Administration section:
Choose the Users tab:
Select New User and follow the instructions in the wizard to add a new user:

Create a License Registration Token

To create a new token, log into CSSM and select the appropriate Virtual Account:
Click on the "Smart Licenses" link to enter CSSM:
In CSSM click on "New Token...":
Follow the dialog to provide a description, expiration and export compliance applicability before accepting the terms and responsibilities. Click on "Create Token" to continue.
Click on the new token:
Copy the token from the dialogue window into your clipboard:

Go to the NSO CLI and provide the token to the license smart register idtoken command:

admin@ncs# license smart register idtoken YzY2YjFlOTYtOWYzZi00MDg1...
Registration process in progress.
Use the 'show license status' command to check the progress and result.

Notes on Configuring Smart Licensing

Note

If ncs.conf contains configuration for any of java-executable, java-options, override-url/url or proxy/url under the configure path /ncs-config/smart-license/smart-agent/ any corresponding configuration done via the CLI is ignored.

Note

The smart licensing component of NSO runs its own Java virtual machine. Usually the default Java options are sufficient:

          leaf java-options {
          tailf:info "Smart licensing Java VM start options";
          type string;
          default "-Xmx64M -Xms16M
          -Djava.security.egd=file:/dev/./urandom";
          description
          "Options which NCS will use when starting
          the Java VM.";}

If you for some reason need to modify the Java options, remember to include the default values as found in the YANG model.

Validation and Troubleshooting

Available Show Commands

show license all: Displays all information
show license status: Displays status information
show license summary: Displays summary
show license tech: Displays license tech support information
show license usage: Displays usage information

Available Show Commands

debug smart_lic all: All available Smart Licensing debug flags