Cached License Server - User Guide

This document provides instructions on how to work with our cached license server.

Table of Contents

1. Ingesting Licenses
2. Viewing License Server Details
3. Viewing License Dates
4. Acquiring a License
5. Device Certificate Updates
6. Activation
7. Technical Requirements
8. Customer Support

Ingesting Licenses

Swank Motion Pictures delivers licenses and keys to the customer over the internet. Licenses are requested by the license server to Swank to retrieve licenses. The License server is required to have an occasional connection to the internet in order to pull these licenses for playback to occur. 

Viewing License Server Details

The server endpoint https://yoursubdomain.swankmp.net/services/api/v1/LicenseServerDetails will return license server details. The data returned will include the active status, license server id, and version.

Viewing License dates

The server endpoint https://yoursubdomain.swankmp.net/services/api/v1/licenses?portalId=[guid] when loaded in a browser or by your code will return a list of licenses registered with the server.  Swank Motion Pictures provides the customer with the guid for the portal id.  The response is a json formatted message with fields ProductNumber, ValidFrom, and ValidTo.  Product Number is Swank’s identification number for that particular title.  Valid From is the date when the title becomes viewable and Valid To is the date when the title becomes expired. 

Device certificate updates

Google requires that our license server stays up to date with its latest device certificates.  The server will attempt to call home to Swank Motion Pictures on a daily basis to check for any device cert updates.  Swank Motion Pictures has a nightly process that will retrieve any device cert updates from Google and will provide this file to any license servers calling home.  It is understood that at times the server may not have internet access, but it is recommended that the server have an internet connection at least once a month so that it can download any new device certificates. 

Activation

The license server image must be activated prior to use. Activation requires an internet connection. Swank will provide an activation code separately from the License server. Each license server a unique activation code. Activation can be performed in one of two ways

• A user interface is available via a browser at https://yoursubdomain.swankmp.net/activation/.
• API activation is available via the example curl command shown below. Replace YOUR_URL_ENCODED_ACTIVATION_CODE with the provided activation code.

curl 'https://yoursubdomain.swankmp.net/activation/api/v1/activate' -H 'content-type: application/json' -X POST --data '{"activationCode": "YOUR_URL_ENCODED_ACTIVATION_CODE"}'

When using the API a successful response is in the following form:

{
  "success": true,

  "errorMessage": null
}

In the event of an error, the value of "success" will be "false" and "errorMessage" will contain a message describing the failure. Do not base the success of the API call on the status code as all activation requests are returned with an HTTP 200 status code, including responses that are not successful.

Technical Requirements

The license server requires access to the following urls on a periodic basis.  Please make sure all firewall rules are in place for this access.

• VM Requirements

  • 1 vCPU
  • 6 GB vRAM
  • 8 GB Storage

• Network Requirements

  • The license server requires access to the following URLs on a periodic basis. Please make sure all firewall rules are in place for this access.

    URL	Port/ Protocol	Description
    https://discolicservtel.swankmp.net	tcp:443	Required for troubleshooting
    https://discolicservact.swankmp.net	tcp:443	Required for server activation
    https://discolicservsync.swankmp.net	tcp:443	Required for receiving content licenses over the internet
    https://sdk.widevine.com/stats/setsdkstats	tcp:443	Required for sending statistics back to Google
    ren.swankmp.net	tcp:33001, SSH	Required for system software updates. It is recommended to allow access to all subdomains on swankmp.net in case more are added or changed at a future date.
    jcat.swankmp.net	tcp:80
    stimpson.azurecr.io	tcp:443	Docker registry and also required for system updates
    stimpson.northcentralus.data.azurecr.io	tcp:443	Data endpoint for Azure
    Note: DNS resolution is required for these domain names on the local license server.   If you're operating in a disconnected mode, you may be required to host local DNS records for the URLs above.

Customer Support

The license server has a limited account that can be used by the customer to help with troubleshooting if there is a problem.  This account also allows you to setup the network configuration.

To setup the network, SSH into the server using the username “customer”, contact Swank Motion Pictures for the password and follow the guide linked below:

• Cached License Server V2 - Changing IP Address/Network – Swank Motion Pictures, Inc.

Once the information is entered and verified the network configuration setup will be complete. 

There are several logs on the server that can be accessed if an issue is suspected.  These can be found in the /var/log/swank directory. 

• activation.log – contains information regarding server activation.
• ansible-pull.log – contains information regarding ingests that have been done on the server.
• licenses_server_services.log – contains information written by the service that manages the issuing of licenses. 

If an issue is suspected on the server, you may be asked by Swank support to send one or more of these logs. Note: The customer account cannot traverse to this directory, but you can run the following command to copy the logs to your home directory:

cp -r /var/log/swank ~

Once copied, use a scp command line tool or a program such as WinSCP to copy the files to your local machine and then email them to us.

One important thing to note, every few minutes the activation service will check the MAC address to make sure it hasn’t changed since activation.  If the MAC address is changed the box will no longer function and will require re-activation.  Once the server is reactivated it will function normally again. 

© 2021 Swank Motion Pictures. All rights reserved. These materials are confidential.   Information in these materials is restricted to Swank Motion Pictures authorized recipients only.