COMSOL Multiphysics

Installation Guide
COMSOL Multiphysics Installation Guide
© 1998–2025 COMSOL
Protected by patents listed on [Link]/patents, or see Help > About COMSOL Multiphysics on the File
menu in the COMSOL Desktop for less detailed lists of U.S. Patents that may apply. Patents pending.
This Documentation and the Programs described herein are furnished under the COMSOL Software License
Agreement ([Link]/sla) and may be used or copied only under the terms of the license agreement.
COMSOL, the COMSOL logo, COMSOL Multiphysics, COMSOL Desktop, COMSOL Compiler, COMSOL Server,
and LiveLink are either registered trademarks or trademarks of COMSOL AB. All other trademarks are the property
of their respective owners, and COMSOL AB and its subsidiaries and products are not affiliated with, endorsed by,
sponsored by, or supported by those trademark owners. For a list of such trademark owners, see [Link]/
trademarks.
Version: COMSOL 6.4

Contact Information
Visit the Contact COMSOL page at [Link]/contact to submit general inquiries or
search for an address and phone number. You can also visit the Worldwide Sales Offices page at
[Link]/contact/offices for address and contact information.

If you need to contact Support, an online request form is located on the COMSOL Access page
at [Link]/support/case. Useful links:

• Support Center: [Link]/support

• Product Download: [Link]/product-download
• Product Updates: [Link]/product-update
• COMSOL Blog: [Link]/blogs
• Discussion Forum: [Link]/forum
• Events: [Link]/events
• COMSOL Video Gallery: [Link]/videos
• Support Knowledge Base: [Link]/support/knowledgebase
• Learning Center: [Link]/support/learning-center

Part number: CM010002

Contents

Before You Begin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9

Installation Media Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
System Requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Previous Installations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Software License Agreement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
License Types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
License Management Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
COMSOL Access . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Installing on Windows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16
Installation over the Internet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Downloading and Installing the COMSOL Software . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Installation from a USB Flash Drive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
Running the COMSOL Installer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
Removing (Uninstalling) the COMSOL Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Installing Software Updates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
Automated Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Product Updates and Library Updates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
LiveLink™ fo r E xc e l ® Installations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
LiveLink™ fo r A u t o C A D ® Installations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
LiveLink™ fo r I n v en t or ® Installations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
LiveLink™ fo r P T C ® C r e o ® P a r a m et r i c ™ Installation . . . . . . . . 46
LiveLink™ fo r R ev i t ® Installations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

|3
 LiveLink™ fo r S o l i d E d g e ® Installations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
LiveLink™ fo r S O L I D W O R K S ® Installations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Cluster Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
License Manager Installation on Windows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
What Is the FlexNet® License Manager? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
System Requirements for the FlexNet® License Manager . . . . . . 53
FlexNet® License Manager Software Components . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
FlexNet® License Manager Documentation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
The License File and The License Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
Installing the License Manager . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
Starting the License Manager . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
Verifying That the License Manager Is Running . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
Starting COMSOL Multiphysics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
Changing the License . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
Using COMSOL on an IPv6 Network . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
Troubleshooting License Errors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
Running COMSOL Multiphysics on Windows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
The COMSOL Multiphysics Folder on The Start Menu . . . . . . . . 68
Starting COMSOL Multiphysics for a Classkit License . . . . . . . . . . 69
Creating Desktop Shortcuts Manually . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
Running COMSOL Multiphysics in Client–Server Mode . . . . . . . . 71
Running COMSOL Multiphysics in Batch Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
Multicore Settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
Running COMSOL Multiphysics on Clusters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75

4|
 Running COMSOL Multiphysics on the Cloud . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
Running COMSOL Multiphysics with MATLAB . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
Running COMSOL Multiphysics with Simulink . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
Installing on macOS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .78
Installation Over the Internet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
Downloading and Installing the COMSOL Software . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Installation from USB Flash Drive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
Running The COMSOL Installer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
Automated Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
Removing (Uninstalling) the COMSOL Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Product Updates and Application Library Update . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
Changing the Path to the MATLAB® Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
Cluster Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
License Manager Installation on macOS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .87
FlexNet® License Manager Software Components . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
FlexNet® License Manager Documentation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
The License File . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
Installing the License Manager . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
Starting the License Manager . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
Verifying That the License Manager Is Running . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Starting COMSOL Multiphysics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Changing the License . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Using COMSOL on an IPv6 Network . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
Troubleshooting License Errors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93

|5
 Running COMSOL Multiphysics on macOS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
The COMSOL Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
Running COMSOL Multiphysics from a Terminal Window . . . . . 95
Running a Classkit License . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
Running COMSOL on Clusters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
Running COMSOL Multiphysics in Client–Server Mode . . . . . . . . 96
Running COMSOL Multiphysics in Batch Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
Multicore Settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
Running COMSOL Multiphysics on Clusters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
Running COMSOL Multiphysics on the Cloud . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
Installing on Linux . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
Installation Over the Internet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
Downloading and Installing the COMSOL Software . . . . . . . . . . 103
Installing from a DVD . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104
Installation from USB Flash Drive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
Running The COMSOL Installer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
Web Browser for Viewing Documentation and Help . . . . . . . . . 106
Automated Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
Removing (Uninstalling) the COMSOL Installation . . . . . . . . . . . 107
Product Updates and Application Library Update . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
Changing the Path to the MATLAB® Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
Cluster Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
License Manager Installation on Linux . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
FlexNet® License Manager Software Components . . . . . . . . . . . 110

6|
 FlexNet® License Manager Documentation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
The License File . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
Installing the License Manager . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
Starting the License Manager . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
Verifying That the License Manager Is Running . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
Starting COMSOL Multiphysics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
Changing the License . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
Using COMSOL on an IPv6 Network . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
Troubleshooting License Errors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
Running COMSOL Multiphysics on Linux . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
Running COMSOL Multiphysics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
Multicore Settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
Running COMSOL Multiphysics in Batch Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
Running COMSOL Multiphysics in Client–Server Mode . . . . . . . 119
Running a Classkit License . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
Running COMSOL on Clusters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
Running COMSOL Multiphysics on the Cloud . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
Running COMSOL Multiphysics with MATLAB . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
Running COMSOL Multiphysics with Simulink . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
COMSOL Security . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
COMSOL Multiphysics Client–Server Security . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
Application and Physics Builder Security . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
Method Security . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
COMSOL Server Security . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127

|7
 Troubleshooting License Errors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135

8|
Before You Begin

Welcome to the COMSOL Multiphysics Installation Guide, which provides

instructions on how to install COMSOL Multiphysics® and its add-on products.
In addition to this manual, several online resources are available which are relevant
for installation:
• System Requirements: [Link]/system-requirements
• Support Knowledge Base: [Link]/support/knowledgebase
• Support Center: [Link]/support
• COMSOL Software License Agreement: [Link]/sla
• Product Download: [Link]/product-download
• Product Updates: [Link]/product-update
• COMSOL Video Gallery: [Link]/videos
• Learning Center: [Link]/support/learning-center

I n s ta l l at i o n M e d i a O p ti o n s

There are four installation media options for COMSOL 6.4:

• Installation over the internet:
- This option requires internet access from the computer where COMSOL is
to be installed.
• Installation from a downloaded DVD or DMG image:
- This option requires internet access from any computer for downloading the
DVD image file (.iso file extension, for Windows® and Linux®) or DMG
image file (.dmg file extension, for macOS).
• Installation from a DVD given to you by a COMSOL representative:
- This option requires access to a DVD reader on the computer where
COMSOL Multiphysics is to be installed.
• Installation from a USB Flash Drive given to you by a COMSOL
representative:
- This option requires a USB port on the computer where COMSOL is to be
installed.
Installation using any of these four options is explained later in this document.

|9
System Requirements

COMSOL Multiphysics is a cross-platform software that runs on the Windows®,

macOS, and Linux® operating systems. A variety of hardware platforms are
supported, including graphics cards. Before installing, make sure your computer
meets the current requirements listed at: [Link]/system-requirements.
The system requirements page also lists compatible software versions for:
• External function C compiler
• COMSOL API when used with Java®
• LiveLink™ for MATLAB®
• LiveLink™ for Simulink®
• LiveLink™ for Excel®
• CAD Import Module
• Design Module
• LiveLink™ for SOLIDWORKS®
• LiveLink™ for Inventor®
• LiveLink™ for AutoCAD®
• LiveLink™ for Revit®
• LiveLink™ for PTC® Creo®Parametric™
• LiveLink™ for Solid Edge®
• File Import for CATIA® V5

Previous Installations

Previous installations of COMSOL are not affected by your new COMSOL 6.4
installation, except that double-clicking a Model MPH file will open it in the latest
installation (unless otherwise specified). You can continue to use other versions or
uninstall them independently of the latest installation.

In this guide, the term COMSOL 6.4 refers not only to

COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 but also to any of the add-on
products, as well as COMSOL Server 6.4 and its add-ons.

10 |
S o f t w a r e L i c e n s e A g r ee m e n t

For the complete software license agreement with details on the license
conditions, please refer to the COMSOL Software License Agreement. The PDF
can be downloaded at [Link]/sla. The license agreement is also
available in your installation folder.
• On Windows, it is located at:
C:\Program Files\COMSOL\COMSOL64\Multiphysics\doc
\pdf\COMSOL_Multiphysics\COMSOL_SoftwareLicenseAgreement.pdf

and can also be accessed from the Windows Start menu, under
COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 > COMSOL Documentation.
• On macOS, it is located at:
/Applications/COMSOL64/Multiphysics/doc/pdf/COMSOL_Multiphysics/
COMSOL_SoftwareLicenseAgreement.pdf

• On Linux, it is located in the installation directory, for example:

/usr/local/comsol64/multiphysics/doc/pdf/COMSOL_Multiphysics/
COMSOL_SoftwareLicenseAgreement.pdf

License Types

There is a variety of license options, and the steps involved when installing can
differ depending on which license type you have acquired. No license type restricts
usage to just one operating system but you are able to choose to install on either
Windows, macOS, or Linux. A COMSOL Multiphysics model file saved on one
platform can be opened on another. Certain license types come with restrictions;
make sure you know which license type you have before proceeding with the
installation.

All COMSOL licenses allow for multicore/multiprocessor

shared-memory computing. How many cores or processors you
can utilize is only limited by your hardware configuration and
operating system. You can control the number of cores and
processors in use from the Computing > Multicore page in the
Preferences window.

| 11
 For a full description and definition of the different license types,
see the COMSOL Software License Agreement. All of the license
types may not be available in your region.

COMSOL M ULTIPHYSICS
The following is an overview of the license types for COMSOL Multiphysics:
Named Single User License (NSL)
The COMSOL Multiphysics software may be installed and operated on up to four
(4) individual computers, provided it is only accessible to, and operated by, a
single licensed user designated by us as the Named User for that license and
provided that the Named User may concurrently use the software on only two (2)
of those computers at any given time. For each computer, there is no restriction
on the number of simultaneous sessions that the Named User may run.
Locked Single User License (CPU)
You can install the COMSOL Multiphysics software on one designated computer
and different users can take turns using the software on that computer, one user
at a time. There is no restriction on the number of simultaneous sessions that the
one user may run. The CPU version of the software may not be accessed or used
over a network or remotely.
Floating Network License (FNL)
Licensed per concurrent user, you can install the software on as many machines on
your network as needed within your country or territory. The COMSOL
Multiphysics software can run on local computers, with the network used only for
license authentication. Alternatively, you can run the software on a remote
computer over your network. Support for remote computing includes using
Windows® Remote Desktop. In addition, this license type allows access to the
COMSOL computational engine using a client. For example, you can run the
graphical user interface on an inexpensive local machine, while offloading the
heavy computations to a remote high-end machine. Cluster and cloud computing
is supported on Windows® and Linux® platforms. For local use, there is no
restriction on the number of simultaneous sessions for one concurrent user. With
respect to cluster computing and cluster sweeps, a single model may be run on
multiple compute nodes with no restriction on the number of compute nodes.
Class Kit License (CKL)
Up to 30 teachers and students can run the software for classroom purposes over
the school’s network where they access the license on-campus or through a secure
remote connection.

12 |
COMSOL C OMPILER
The COMSOL Compiler is available under the following license types: Named
Single User License (NSL), CPU-Locked Single User License (CPU), and
Floating Network License (FNL). All those license types are described in the
section above on COMSOL Multiphysics.

COMSOL S ERVER
The following is an overview of the license types for COMSOL Server:
COMSOL Server License (CSL)
Licensed on a concurrent user basis. Each concurrent user may run up to four
concurrent applications. The CSL version of the software enables you to run
applications built with the Application Builder. The CSL allows you to host and
run those applications within your organization and also to those outside your
organization who time share your concurrent user slots, worldwide. Applications
can be accessed through a major web browser on a variety of operating systems or
a COMSOL client for the Windows® operating system. See [Link]/
system-requirements for detailed requirements.
Academic Server License (ASL)
Licensed on a 300 concurrent user basis, each concurrent user may run up to four
concurrent applications. The ASL version of the software enables you to run
applications built with the Application Builder. The ASL allows you to host and

| 13
run those applications for students, faculty, and staff of your academic institution
or of any other academic institution, worldwide.

License Management Tools

The FlexNet® License Manager Software

Depending on your region and operating system, any of the above license types
may require that the FlexNet® license manager software is installed and started
before running a COMSOL product. The FlexNet® license manager is bundled
with any COMSOL installation. You can view the contents of the license file
([Link]) that you received from your COMSOL representative by opening
it with a text editor. If the file contains a line starting with the word SERVER, the
license manager is required. For a Floating Network License, the purpose of the
license manager is to count the number of concurrent users and to give an error
message if the number of users exceeds the licensed number of concurrent users.
Depending on your region and operating system, the license manager might also
be needed for a Single User License. In that case, the purpose of the license
manager is to lock the COMSOL session to a COMSOL authorized computer.
See License Manager Installation on Windows for more information. The
COMSOL software products and the license manager can be installed in any
order, except if you are installing based on a port number and hostname. In that
case, the license manager software needs to be installed and started before
installing COMSOL.
We recommend that you use the license manager bundled with COMSOL 6.4.
Using a license manager bundled with earlier COMSOL versions might work, but
we recommend that you use the license manager from the latest COMSOL
version. Use the license manager from the latest COMSOL version also for earlier
COMSOL versions if possible. See the [Link]/system-requirements
for detailed requirements.

14 |
Dongle Hardware Lock
Depending on your region and operating system, any of the above license types
might require a dongle (hardware lock). If you have received a dongle to use with
COMSOL, please refer to instructions given to you by your COMSOL
representative.

CO M S O L A c c e s s

COMSOL Access is a service provided by COMSOL that gives you access to

additional content on [Link] and allows you to:
• Download products
• Update products (restricted to customers with an active subscription)
• Edit contact and license information
• Access the Knowledge Base (unabridged access to all parts is restricted to
customers with an active subscription)
• Contact technical support
• Manage event registrations
• Manage abstract submissions to the COMSOL Conference
• Access to the COMSOL Exchange online model sharing
• Participate in the Community Discussion Forum
Registering with COMSOL Access is required for product download and
installation.

| 15
Installing on Windows

I n s ta l l a t i o n o ve r t h e I n t e r n e t

I NSTALLATION OF A T RIAL L ICENSE OVER THE I NTERNET

A trial license can be given to you with the intention to test the software without
any payment obligation for noncommercial and nonproduction use. This option
is not available in all regions.
Installation of a Single User Trial License requires a license passcode. A passcode
has a form similar to:
9FFF3FFFF7F5-TYUS-140917-17074436-384661755

This is usually sent to you by a COMSOL representative by email. Once you locate
your passcode, follow these steps to prepare for download and installation:
1 Click the link for downloading the software as given in the software download
email from your COMSOL representative. This link is identical or similar to:
[Link]/product-download.
2 If you have not already created a COMSOL Access account, you are prompted
to create it. When you have created the account, you can enter your license
passcode to associate it with your account information.
If you already created a COMSOL Access account, you can associate the license
file with your account on the COMSOL Access page under Manage Licenses at
[Link]/access/licenses.
3 Follow the web-based instructions to download the software.
4 Continue with the instructions in the section Downloading and Installing the
COMSOL Software.
A license passcode can also be used for class kit licenses (CKL).

I NSTALLATION OF A P AID - FOR L ICENSE OVER THE I NTERNET

Installation of any paid-for license on Windows requires a license file that is sent
to you by your COMSOL representative by email. To be able to generate the
license file, information about your hardware is needed in the form of a hostid
(host ID). The hostid is used to lock the license to your hardware and needs to be
sent by you to a COMSOL representative prior to the license file being generated.

16 |
Obtaining the Hostid
Follow these steps to obtain a hostid:
1 Open the Windows Command Prompt (cmd).
2 At the command line, type ipconfig /all and press Enter. The output should
look similar to this:

3 The hostid you are looking for is here called Physical Address, also known as
Ethernet address or MAC address.
Obtaining the Hostname
If you have been informed by your COMSOL representative that you need to run
a license manager for your installation, then you also need the Host Name (see the
screenshot above). If your network administrator prefers to use a fixed IP address
for this particular computer, that IP address can be optionally used in place of the
Host Name. For more information on license manager installation see License
Manager Installation on Windows.
Hostid for PCs with Wireless Adapters
If you plan to install on a computer with a wireless network adapter, you need the
physical address of both the wireless and the Ethernet adapter.
If the COMSOL representative asks you for the hard disk serial number instead of
the hostid, type vol at the Windows command line prompt. The output should
look similar to this:
Volume Serial Number is 2C9F-5930

Obtaining the License File from a COMSOL Representative

Send the hostid information, as well as hostname, if applicable, in an email to your
COMSOL representative, who responds with an email including an attached
license file ([Link]). Save this file to any location on your computer. You
need to refer to it during installation.
The license file is a text file and below is an example of the contents of a
[Link] file for a Single User License on Windows. In this example, the
licensed products are COMSOL Multiphysics, Particle Tracing Module,
Subsurface Flow Module, and LiveLink™ for Excel®.

| 17
 #------------------------------------------------------------------
# COMSOL 6.4 NSL License No: 1234567 Windows/Mac
# Visit [Link]/install for latest installation instructions
#------------------------------------------------------------------
FEATURE SERIAL LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent uncounted \
VENDOR_STRING=C,18000100200 HOSTID=ANY sort=100 \
SN=1234567 TS_OK SIGN=8045890A6FE4
FEATURE COMSOL LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent uncounted \
HOSTID="70f1a12f4dfc" PLATFORMS="x64_n x64_mac arm64_mac" \
SN=2076312 SIGN=E607EB680852
FEATURE PARTICLETRACING LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent uncounted \
HOSTID="70f1a12f4dfc" PLATFORMS="x64_n x64_mac arm64_mac" \
SN=2076312 SIGN=3835733C6290
FEATURE SUBSURFACEFLOW LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent uncounted \
HOSTID="70f1a12f4dfc" PLATFORMS="x64_n x64_mac arm64_mac" \
SN=2076312 SIGN=3A9BA162C9E4
FEATURE LLEXCEL LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent uncounted \
HOSTID="70f1a12f4dfc" PLATFORMS="x64_n x64_mac arm64_mac" \
SN=2076312 SIGN=EE9C11E44356
FEATURE COMSOLGUI LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent uncounted \
HOSTID="70f1a12f4dfc" PLATFORMS="x64_n x64_mac arm64_mac"\
SN=2076312 SIGN=0D0A83382550

A Single User License file can normally not be edited in any way by the user and
has to be identical to the one sent to you by a COMSOL representative. If you
were sent a license file that requires a license manager, then minor edits are
required. For information on the type of license file required for installations using
a license manager, see The License File and The License Features.
Registering with COMSOL Access
Once you have saved your license file, follow these steps to register or login to
COMSOL Access to start the installation:
1 Click the link for downloading the software as given in the software download
email from your COMSOL representative. This link is identical or similar to:
[Link]/product-download.
2 If you have not already created a COMSOL Access account, you are prompted
to create it. When you have created the account, point to your license file
([Link]) to associate it with your account information.
If you already have a COMSOL Access account, you can associate the license
file with your account under Manage Licenses at [Link]/access/
licenses.
3 Continue with the instructions in the next section.

18 |
D o w n lo a d i n g a n d I n s t a l l i n g t h e C O M S O L So f t w a r e

1 Go to the web page [Link]/product-download. To download the

COMSOL installer, you must first create a COMSOL Access account as
described in the section Installation over the Internet.
2 You are now given the options of downloading the COMSOL online installer
or the COMSOL offline installer (an ISO image).

If you have problems downloading (such as Error downloading file.

Connection refused: connect), please review this knowledge base
entry: [Link]/support/knowledgebase/1149. If you
still have problems, contact your local COMSOL representative or
technical support: [Link]/support.

S TARTING THE O NLINE I NSTALLER FOR I NSTALLATION OVER THE I NTERNET

Start the COMSOL Installer by running the downloaded file COMSOL64_win.exe.
The COMSOL 6.4 Installer window should now appear. Next, continue with the
instructions in the section Running the COMSOL Installer.

I NSTALLATION FROM D OWNLOADED ISO I MAGE

1 Download the ISO image. The default image, COMSOL64_dvd.iso, is too large to
burn to disc. For installations that require physical discs, download the files
COMSOL64_dvd_1.iso, COMSOL64_dvd_2.iso and COMSOL64_dvd_3.iso instead.
2 If you have downloaded the single ISO image, you will need to mount it
directly. In all supported Windows versions, this can be done by right-clicking
the ISO image, selecting Mount and then continuing with the installation as if
the files were on a DVD. If you have downloaded the split ISO images, you will
need to burn them to discs. In all supported Windows versions, you can burn a
disc by right-clicking the ISO image and selecting Burn to disc.

INSTALLING FROM A DVD OR MOUNTED DVD IMAGE

Once you have inserted the COMSOL DVD into the DVD drive (or mounted the
image), the COMSOL Installer window should appear automatically; if not, run
the file [Link] on the installation DVD. The COMSOL 6.4 Installer window
should now appear. Now continue with the instructions in the section Running
the COMSOL Installer.

| 19
Installation from a USB Flash Drive

If you have received a USB Flash Drive from a COMSOL representative, insert the
USB Flash Drive into a USB port on your computer. The COMSOL Installer
window should appear automatically; if not, run the file [Link] on the USB
Flash Drive. The COMSOL 6.4 Installer window should now appear. Now
continue with the instructions in the section Running the COMSOL Installer.

Running the COMSOL Installer

The steps for running the COMSOL Installer are independent of the installation
media. Once the installer has started, continue with the instructions in this section.

L ANGUAGE P AGE

1 Select your language for the installation and click Next. You might also need to
install fonts for the languages that you want to use when running COMSOL.

20 |
M AIN P AGE

2 In the COMSOL Installer, select one of the following options:

- Click New COMSOL 6.4 Installation and proceed to Step 3 (License Page).
- Click Add/Remove Products and Reinstall and proceed to Step 5 (Platform
Page) to change or repair an existing installation. For example, use Add/
Remove Products and Reinstall to add or remove documentation files for
installed products, or to add or remove a product that your license includes.
- Click Change License and proceed to Step 3 (License Page) to update the
license of an existing installation. Use this option when COMSOL is installed
and you get a new license file. The installer will remove products not licensed
any more and let you go through the Add/Remove Products procedure to
add or remove products for the new license. If your trial license has expired,
you can use the Change License option to reenable a paid license.
- Click Uninstall COMSOL 6.4 to remove an existing installation. For instructions
on this option, see Removing (Uninstalling) the COMSOL Installation.

You can specify the path of an existing installation by pressing F1.

| 21
L ICENSE P AGE
3 For a new installation or a license change, the following is displayed:

After reading the license agreement, click the I accept the terms of the license
agreement button and specify the license. Choose one of the following license
formats from the License format list, depending on which license you have:
- Passcode: Use this option for a Single-User Trial License or Class Kit License.
Enter your passcode, which is a case-sensitive series of characters and numbers
with a form similar to FFFFFFFFFFFF-TYUS-123456-1234567-123456789.
- License file: Use this option for any type of regular paid-for license installation.
Enter the path to a license file or click Browse to select the file [Link].
This file is sent to you by a COMSOL representative, typically by email.
- Port number and Hostname: Use this option if your license administrator has
given you a port number and hostname for a license manager for COMSOL
that is running on your organization’s network. Enter the Hostname of the
server running the license manager and its license manager port number.
- Three-server redundancy: Use this option if your license administrator has
given you three port numbers and hostnames for the three-server redundancy
license manager option. Enter the hostnames and license server port numbers
of the three-server redundant configuration.

22 |
Change License
If Change License was selected in Step 2, first select Use current paid license, to use
an existing license, or Specify new license, to use a new license, from the License list.

Click Next and proceed to Step 5 if you want to change to a license with different
products. Otherwise, proceed to Step 10.
4 Click Next.
You can also automate a license change. If you specify a new license in
[Link] and set installdir to an existing comsol installation directory
(the installed version must match the version of the setup program), the installer
will use the new license and add or remove products as needed to match the new
license. See the description of the Installer Mode inside the [Link] file.

| 23
L ICENSE N UMBER P AGE

This page only appears if you have a license file corresponding to several different
licenses (a so-called merged license file). From the list of license numbers, select
the one you want to install. Both COMSOL Multiphysics licenses and COMSOL
Server licenses can appear here. The license number you choose will determine
which products are available on the next page.

24 |
P RODUCTS P AGE

5 Select the COMSOL products to install, which applications and documentation

to install, and specify the path to the COMSOL installation folder.
All products that your license includes are selected by default.

For more information about installing and configuring the CUDA

Toolkit for use with COMSOL Multiphysics, see:
[Link]/learn/cudatoolkit.

For more information about setting up the Chatbot functionality,

see: [Link]/learn/chatbot.

The License Manager checkbox is also selected. Depending on your region and
operating system, the license type may require that the license manager is
installed and started before running COMSOL (see License Management

| 25
 Tools). In some cases, however, the license manager is installed automatically
during the COMSOL installation.
From the options under Application libraries, choose one of the following:
- Install application libraries for selected products (the default) to install the
application libraries for the licensed products that you have selected.
- Install application libraries for all products to install the application libraries for
all COMSOL products.
- Install application library previews for selected products to install previews of
the application libraries for the licensed products that you have selected.
- Install application library previews for all products to install previews of all
application files in the application libraries for all COMSOL products.
- Do not include application libraries to not install any application libraries.
Selected applications can be downloaded via Application Library Update.
From the options under Documentation, choose one of the following:
- Install documentation relevant to selected products (the default) to install the
documentation for the licensed products that you have selected. For some
products, documentation for other relevant products is also installed, so that
you get access to documentation for functionality included in the licensed
products but covered in other products’ documentation.
- Install documentation for all products to install the documentation for all
COMSOL products. You can then view and search all COMSOL
documentation, even for products not included in your license.
- Online documentation only to not install any documentation. You can still view
documentation and access context help using online documentation provided
by COMSOL, but no documentation files are installed on your computer.
Under Destination folder, a default installation destination is suggested; for
Windows, typically C:\Program Files\COMSOL\COMSOL64\Multiphysics. Click
Browse or type another destination directory if needed.

If Change License was selected earlier (for an existing installation),

make sure that all the relevant product checkboxes are selected. If
the new license adds products that were not included in the
original installation and the checkboxes for those products are not
selected, the license information will be correct but the software
components needed to use the products will be missing.

26 |
Add/Remove Products and Reinstall
- If Add/Remove Products and Reinstall or Change License was selected in Step 2,
the Products page includes a Reinstall selected and installed products
checkbox. Select this to reinstall selected products that are already installed.
- The options for application libraries and documentation can also be changed.

You can also add, remove, and repair COMSOL products from
the installed instance by running the setup executable in the
installation directory. If needed, the installer can either download
the files from the internet or use the original DVD (or disk image).

6 Click Next.

| 27
O PTIONS PAGE : FIRST SECTION

7 On this page, you can set the following installation options:

- Create COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 shortcuts on Windows Desktop.
- Create COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 folder on Windows Start Menu.
- Add Windows Firewall rules for COMSOL programs. This checkbox adds firewall
rules that allow COMSOL server programs to open ports and communicate
over the network. If you clear this checkbox, you might get a warning from
the Microsoft Firewall when you start a COMSOL server program, or a
COMSOL server program might not work as expected.
- Configure security policy. If you select this option, a later page in the installer
provides security options that you can either set permanently or as user
defaults; see Security Page. If you set a permanent security policy, the security
settings in the Preferences window will be read-only.
- If you want to use a proxy server, specify the hostname, port number, and, if
required, a username and password. If you do not enter a port number, the

28 |
 installer will use port 443 (the default port for the HTTPS protocol.) These
settings do not appear for offline installation methods.
The following options are available under Update:
- Check for updates after installation. This option is selected by default. The
installer will apply all available updates (if any) for the installed version.
- Enable automatic check for updates. Select this checkbox if you want
COMSOL to automatically check for available product updates at startup.
- Enable automatic check for new releases. Select this checkbox if you want
COMSOL to automatically check for new full releases at startup.
- By default, COMSOL 6.4 uses an included Java 21 runtime, indicated by the
Built-in setting in the Java runtime environment list. If you want to run
COMSOL with another Java 21 runtime that you have licensed and installed,
specify its location in the Location field by first choosing Custom.
The CUDA and cuDSS sections are available in the case that GPU Compute
Components was selected on the Products page, but NVIDIA CUDA® Toolkit and/
or NVIDIA CUDA® Direct Sparse Solver were not.
- If a compatible NVIDIA CUDA® Toolkit is already installed on the system,
specify the installation directory in the Custom CUDA directory field to enable
GPU hardware acceleration. This path can also be changed on the Computing
> GPU Acceleration page in the Preferences window. For more information
about installing the CUDA Toolkit for use with COMSOL Multiphysics, see
[Link]/learn/cudatoolkit.
- If a compatible NVIDIA CUDA® Direct Sparse Solver library is already
installed on the system, specify the installation directory in the Custom cuDSS
directory field to enable the GPU-accelerated direct sparse solver. This path

| 29
 can also be changed on the Computing > GPU Acceleration page in the
Preferences window.
- Non-Latin (Asian) language installations have the option to select a different
default font family, such as one that has an appropriate set of Asian characters.

8 Click Next.

30 |
O PTIONS PAGE : SECOND SECTION

9 On this page, you can set the following installation options:

- Associate the .mph file type with this installation. If this checkbox is selected,
you can open COMSOL models by double-clicking them.
- Associate links in the Model Manager server web interface with this installation.
If this checkbox is selected, you can open COMSOL models directly from the
web interface of a Model Manager server.
- For the interface for Microsoft PowerPoint®, which makes it possible to
interactively update PowerPoint presentations with COMSOL images and
tables, choose Install for the current user, Install for all users, or Do not install.
- For the interface for Microsoft Word®, which makes it possible to
interactively update Word documents with COMSOL images and tables,
choose Install for the current user, Install for all users, or Do not install.

| 31
10 Click Next.

Custom Java 21 runtimes must be OpenJDK based and of at least

the same minor version as the built-in one. If the runtime includes
a subset of JDK modules, at least the following must be included:
• java.*
• [Link]
• [Link]
• [Link]
• [Link].*
• [Link]
• [Link]
• [Link]
• [Link]
• [Link]
• [Link]
• [Link]
• [Link]
• [Link]
• [Link].*
• [Link]
• [Link]
• [Link]
• [Link]
• [Link].*
• [Link]
• [Link]
• [Link]

32 |
L IVE L INK P AGE

11 The LiveLink page contains installation settings for the LiveLink™ products:
- Install LiveLink™ for Excel® for all users. If you select this checkbox, the
installation of LiveLink™ for Excel® is global to the machine and is available
no matter which user is logged on. Otherwise, the installation is only available
to the current user.
- For the products LiveLink™ for MATLAB® and LiveLink™ for Simulink®,
specify the path to the MATLAB installation folder. This path can be changed
on the LiveLink Connections page in the Preferences window.

| 33
L ICENSE M ANAGER P AGE

12 The License Manager page appears if the License Manager was selected on the
Products page and your computer is designated to be the license server. If this
page does not appear, you can manage the license server using LMTOOLS; see
Starting the License Manager. This page contains the following options:
- The Install license manager as a Windows service checkbox is selected by
default; if you clear the checkbox, the license manager must be started
manually and will not be available as a Windows service.
- The Path to the debug log file field contains a file path to the location of the
license manager debug log file. Click Browse to choose another file path.
- The Service name field shows the service name, for information only.
- The Additional license manager options section contains the following options:
Select the Allow the lmdown command to be executed only from this computer
checkbox to restrict the access to the lmdown command, which you can use to
shut down the license manager, to this computer only.
Select the Disable the lmdown command checkbox to make the lmdown
command unavailable.
Select the Disable the lmremove command checkbox to make the lmremove
command, which you can use to remove a user’s license, unavailable.

34 |
S ECURITY P AGE

13 The Security page appears if you selected the Configure security policy checkbox.
The COMSOL software includes security settings for controlling access to, for
example, system properties, file systems, and runtime security settings from

| 35
 methods and external libraries, primarily for use in applications created using
the Application Builder.
In the Security policy list, select User defaults (the default) or Permanent to
control if the settings made on this page will be possible to change or set
permanently after the installation is finished.
The following security settings are available in the General section (the top four
checkboxes are selected by default):
- Select the Allow batch jobs checkbox to allow batch jobs. This restriction
affects the Batch, Batch Sweep, Cluster Computing, and Cluster Sweep
nodes in the COMSOL Desktop model tree.
- Select the Allow running methods checkbox to allow running applications that
include methods. If you clear this checkbox, it is not possible to run methods
in applications.
- Select the Allow running applications checkbox to allow running applications
in general. If you clear this checkbox, it is not possible to run any applications.
- Select the Allow settings forms checkbox to allow settings forms and dialog
forms in the Model Builder. If you clear this checkbox, an error message
appears if you try to create a new settings form or show a dialog form.
- From the Allow external libraries list, select No (the default), Yes, or Ask to
control if external C libraries can be called from methods in an application,
either directly or by asking first.
- From the Allow external MATLAB® functions list, select No (the default), Yes, or
Ask to control if functions written in MATLAB (requires LiveLink™ for
MATLAB®) can be called, either directly or by asking first.

In the Methods and Java libraries section, the Enforce security restrictions
checkbox is selected by default. The following settings are available for easing
parts of the restrictions on methods and Java libraries (none selected by default):
- Select the Allow access to system properties checkbox to read and write system
properties. For example, [Link]("[Link]") can be used to
determine how many cores COMSOL Multiphysics is currently using.
- Select the Allow changes to the runtime system checkbox to allow methods and
Java libraries to change the runtime system — for instance, by modifying class
loaders.
- From the File system access list, select Temporary and application files (the
default) to restrict methods and Java libraries to only have access to such files,

36 |
 or select All files to allow methods and Java libraries to access all files that you
have permissions to access on the file system.
- Select the Allow external processes checkbox to allow applications to start
external processes on the computer. This includes using the built-in
executeOS() method.
- Select the Allow access to network sockets checkbox to allow methods and
Java libraries to open sockets for network access.
- Select the Allow control of the network authentication method checkbox to
allow methods and Java libraries to control the network authentication
method used.
- Select the Allow access to classes through reflection checkbox to allow access
to all members in a class through reflection.
- Select the Allow access to runtime security settings checkbox to allow methods
and Java libraries to access security settings.
- Select the Allow access to Model Manager databases checkbox to allow methods
and Java libraries to access Model Manager databases, including both reading
and writing data.
To allow methods and Java libraries to run with security completely disabled,
clear the Enforce security restrictions checkbox and, in the General section, select
the Allow external processes checkbox.
In the Internet section, select the Use a restrictive security policy for model files
downloaded from the internet checkbox to use a restrictive security policy (Mark
of the Web) for model and app files downloaded from the internet. In the
Trusted sites section, you can add and remove internet sites that you want
COMSOL Multiphysics to consider trusted when the restrictive security policy
is enabled. By default, the list of trusted sites contains all the COMSOL
Application Gallery web pages.
14 Click Next.

| 37
I NSTALL PAGE

15 When you click Install the utility will install or update COMSOL. The
installation process can take several minutes. If you are installing over the
internet, the installation time depends on your internet connection speed. The
Finish page appears when the installation process is finished.

38 |
F INISH PAGE
16 This window appears when the installation is finished.

If warnings or errors were detected, click View Log to open a window that shows
the installation log. Contact technical support if you encountered any errors,
and remember to send the log file along with your technical support inquiry.
17 Click Close to quit the installer.

For information on how to run COMSOL Multiphysics after installation, see

Running COMSOL Multiphysics on Windows. If you are installing on macOS,
see Running COMSOL Multiphysics on macOS. If you are installing on Linux,
see Running COMSOL Multiphysics on Linux.

Removing (Uninstalling) the COMSOL Installation

To remove a COMSOL installation from your system, you can use the COMSOL
Installer’s uninstallation option. The uninstaller deletes all COMSOL files and

| 39
directories on the system that were installed by the COMSOL installer. Additional
files and folders created after installation are not removed.
If COMSOL Multiphysics is run with MATLAB, close MATLAB before starting
the uninstaller. If MATLAB is active, the utility cannot remove certain files.
You can start the COMSOL Uninstaller in a few different ways:
• From the Windows Start Menu, open Settings and select Apps. Find
COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 in the list and select Uninstall.
• From the Windows Start Menu, under COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4, select
COMSOL Launchers > Uninstall.
• Insert the COMSOL DVD and start the COMSOL Uninstaller. Click
Uninstall COMSOL 6.4 to start removing the installation. Click Close to quit
the installer when the uninstallation is complete.

Installing Software Updates

COMSOL provides software updates that improve the software and correct issues.
To check if an update is available, choose Check For Product Updates from the Help
menu. To check for updates automatically each time you start COMSOL
Multiphysics, select the Check for product updates at launch checkbox on the
Updates page in the Preferences window.

40 |
If an update is available, an Update dialog appears. Click Direct Download to
download the update directly, or click Product Information to open the COMSOL
website where you can read about and download the update. When the update
installation starts (close any running instance of COMSOL first) you see the
following installation window:

If a COMSOL process is running when you start an update installation, you must
instead first choose one of the following options:
• Cancel: Stop the update process.
• Try Again: Restart the update process (after closing all COMSOL processes.)
• Continue Anyway: Proceed with the upgrade, ignoring any running instances
of COMSOL.
You can use Direct download (the default) or Download via proxy server. If you
download via a proxy server, specify the hostname and port number for the proxy
and, if required, a username and password.
When selecting Manual download, you point to a DAT-file that you download from
[Link]/product-update. This page contains details and options for
manual download of the update.
Alternatively, you can launch the update installer without checking for updates
from inside COMSOL Multiphysics. To do this, from the Windows Start Menu
under COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4, select COMSOL Launchers > Update.

| 41
A UTOMATED U PDATES
You can update the COMSOL software using an automated update process with
minimal user interaction by using the previously mentioned DAT-file. Consult
[Link]/product-update for detailed instructions.

A u t o m a t e d I n s ta l l a t i o n

You can install the COMSOL software using an automated installation process
with minimal user interaction. This method requires installation from a DVD or
DVD image and an answer file.
The answer file is a text file with a specific format that contains predefined settings
for the COMSOL installer. If non-ASCII characters are used, the answer file is
expected to be UTF-8 encoded by default, but UTF-16 is also supported if the
file starts with a byte order mark (BOM).
A template answer file, [Link], with detailed usage information is
available on the DVD. Create a copy of this file and customize it with a text editor.
When the answer file is ready, start the installation by running
<path to DVD>\[Link] -s <answer file path>
where <answer file path> is the full path to your answer file.

A UTOMATED R EMOVAL (U NINSTALLATION ) OF COMSOL

You can also uninstall COMSOL with an answer file by following these steps:
1 Edit the answer file and set installmode to uninstall.
2 Set installdir to the path of the installation you want to remove.
3 Run <path to COMSOL>\bin\win64\[Link] -s <answer file path>

where <answer file path> is the full path to your answer file. If you are running
this command in a command prompt (for example, cmd), make sure that the
current working directory is outside the COMSOL installation directory.

42 |
Product Updates a nd Library Updates

COMSOL periodically releases product updates with improvements and

corrections to reported problems. By default, COMSOL Multiphysics does not
check for updates at startup. You can activate this feature in the Updates page of
the Preferences window.
The Application Libraries for the COMSOL products are updated on a regular
basis by COMSOL. To open the Application Library Update window, from the File
> Help menu (Windows users) or from the Help menu (macOS and Linux users),
select Update COMSOL Application Libraries.
This connects you to the COMSOL Application Library Update website where
you can access the latest updates. This includes files that have been added or
improved since the latest product release.
In a similar way, you can also update the COMSOL Part Libraries. To open the
Part Library Update window, from the File > Help menu (Windows users) or from
the Help menu (macOS and Linux users), select Update COMSOL Part Libraries.

Using the Preferences window, you can set custom application and documentation
directories for Application Library Update, a custom part directory for Part
Library Update, and a custom add-in directory for Add-in Library Update. See the
COMSOL Multiphysics Reference Manual for more information, including
command-line options for the Application Libraries and Part Libraries.

| 43
L i v e L i n k ™ f o r E xc e l ® I n s t a l l a t i o n s

If you have licensed LiveLink™ for Excel®, the installer registers an add-in with
Excel. When the add-in is active, several tools for working with a COMSOL
Multiphysics model from an Excel worksheet are accessible from a COMSOL tab
in the Excel ribbon. You can, for example, extract model definitions and results.
You can also change model definitions in the worksheet, then update and
recompute the model.
Whenever you open a COMSOL Multiphysics model from Excel, a COMSOL
Multiphysics server is started where the model is loaded. The data transfer between
Excel and the COMSOL Multiphysics server application is performed using a
TCP/IP communication protocol, which accepts only local connections.

LiveLink™ for AutoCAD® Installations

If you have licensed LiveLink™ for AutoCAD®, the installer registers an add-in
with AutoCAD. When the add-in is active a COMSOL Multiphysics tab appears
in AutoCAD.
The add-in enables two modes of setting up simulations based on the AutoCAD
design:
• In one mode you can run AutoCAD and the COMSOL Desktop
side-by-side and synchronize the geometry between the two. This mode
enables running parametric sweeps, as well as parameter optimizations using
an optimization solver (available with a license for the Optimization
Module).
• In offline synchronization mode you can save a synchronization file using
the add-in inside AutoCAD. You can then load the synchronization file into
the COMSOL Desktop running on a different computer from the CAD
software. This mode enables single synchronizations and parametric sweeps.

If the COMSOL Multiphysics tab does not appear, run the

COMSOL Installer to repair the installation (see
[Link]/support/knowledgebase/1221 for
instructions).

44 |
 You can also install and register the add-in with AutoCAD by
installing the COMSOL Client, available for download from
[Link]. Such an installation enables the functionality
for preparing AutoCAD designs for synchronization, saving files
for offline synchronization, and running simulation apps that
synchronize geometry.

LiveLink™ for Inventor® Installations

If you have licensed LiveLink™ for Inventor®, the installer registers an add-in for
Autodesk Inventor called LiveLink for COMSOL (6.4). This add-in should
appear in the Add-In Manager dialog that is accessible from the Options tab of the
Tools panel in the Autodesk Inventor user interface.
The add-in provides tools for preparing your Inventor design for simulation with
COMSOL Multiphysics. For example, you can set up dimensional parameters
that, together with the geometry, are synchronized with the COMSOL
Multiphysics model.
The add-in enables several modes of setting up simulations based on the Inventor
design:
• In one mode you can run Inventor and the COMSOL Desktop side-by-side
and synchronize the geometry between the two. This mode enables running
parametric sweeps, as well as parameter optimizations using an optimization
solver (available with a license for the Optimization Module).
• In another mode you can work with COMSOL Multiphysics simulations
inside Inventor. This latter mode is called the One-Window interface.
• In offline synchronization mode you can save a synchronization file using
the add-in inside Autodesk Inventor. You can then load the synchronization
file into the COMSOL Desktop running on a different computer from the
CAD software. This mode enables single synchronizations and parametric
sweeps.

If COMSOL Multiphysics cannot connect to Inventor, run the

COMSOL Installer to repair the installation, see
[Link]/support/knowledgebase/1221 for
instructions.

| 45
 You can also install and register the add-in with Inventor by
installing the COMSOL Client, available for download from
[Link]. Such an installation enables the functionality
for preparing Inventor designs for synchronization, saving files for
offline synchronization, and running simulation apps that
synchronize geometry.

LiveLink™ for PTC® Creo® Parametric™ Installation

If you have licensed LiveLink™ for PTC® Creo® Parametric™, the installer registers
an add-in for PTC Creo Parametric called the LiveLink for COMSOL (6.4). This
add-in should appear in the Auxiliary Applications dialog that is accessible from
the Tools tab, Utilities group in the PTC Creo Parametric user interface.
The add-in provides tools for preparing your PTC Creo Parametric design for
simulation with COMSOL Multiphysics. For example, you can set up dimensional
parameters that, together with the geometry, are synchronized with the
COMSOL Multiphysics model. You can access the functionality provided by the
add-in on the COMSOL Multiphysics tab in the PTC Creo Parametric user
interface.
The add-in enables two modes of setting up simulations based on the PTC Creo
Parametric design:
• In one mode you can run PTC Creo Parametric and the COMSOL Desktop
side-by-side and synchronize the geometry between the two. This enables
running parametric sweeps, as well as parameter optimizations using an
optimization solver (available with a license for the Optimization Module)
• In offline synchronization mode you can save a synchronization file using
the add-in inside PTC Creo Parametric. You can then load the
synchronization file into the COMSOL Desktop running on a different
computer from the CAD software. This mode enables single
synchronizations and parametric sweeps.

If COMSOL Multiphysics cannot connect to PTC Creo

Parametric, run the COMSOL Installer to repair the installation
(see [Link]/support/knowledgebase/1221 for
instructions).

46 |
 You can also install and register the add-in with PTC Creo
Parametric by installing the COMSOL Client, available for
download from [Link]. Such an installation enables the
functionality for preparing PTC Creo Parametric designs for
synchronization, saving files for offline synchronization, and
running simulation apps that synchronize geometry.

L i v e L i n k ™ f o r R ev i t ® I n s t a l l a t i o n s

If you have licensed LiveLink™ for Revit®, the installer registers an add-in for
Autodesk Revit. When the add-in is loaded a tab called COMSOL Multiphysics
appears in Revit. Here, you find tools for preparing your project for simulation
with COMSOL Multiphysics. For example, you can select the architectural
elements and rooms that will take part in the synchronization.
The add-in enables setting up simulations based on a Revit project by
synchronizing geometry between Revit and the COMSOL Desktop when these
are run side-by-side.

The COMSOL Multiphysics tab will not appear if the add-in

cannot be loaded by Revit. This can happen if, for example, the
COMSOL installation is moved to a different location. To restore
the add-in run the COMSOL Installer to repair the installation
(see [Link]/support/knowledgebase/1221 for
instructions).

You can also install and register the add-in with Revit by installing
the COMSOL Client, available for download from
[Link]. Such an installation enables the functionality
for preparing Revit projects for synchronization, and running
simulation apps that synchronize geometry.

| 47
LiveLink™ for Solid Edge® Installations

If you have licensed LiveLink™ for Solid Edge®, the installer registers an add-in for
Solid Edge called LiveLink for COMSOL (6.4). This add-in should appear in the
Add-In Manager dialog that is accessible in the Solid Edge user interface if you
click the Applications button, and then select Add-Ins from the menu.
When the add-in is active a COMSOL Multiphysics tab appears in Solid Edge. The
add-in enables two modes of setting up simulations based on the Solid Edge
design:
• In one mode you can run Solid Edge and the COMSOL Desktop
side-by-side and synchronize the geometry between the two. This enables
running parametric sweeps, as well as parameter optimizations using an
optimization solver (available with a license for the Optimization Module)
• In offline synchronization mode you can save a synchronization file using
the add-in inside Solid Edge. You can then load the synchronization file into
the COMSOL Desktop running on a different computer from the CAD
software. This mode enables single synchronizations and parametric sweeps.

If COMSOL Multiphysics cannot connect to Solid Edge, run the

COMSOL Installer to repair the installation (see
[Link]/support/knowledgebase/1221 for
instructions), or manually register the add-in according to the
steps from the following link “Error: Failed to connect to Solid
Edge”:
[Link]/support/knowledgebase/1160.

You can also install and register the add-in with Solid Edge by
installing the COMSOL Client, available for download from
[Link]. Such an installation enables the functionality
for preparing Solid Edge designs for synchronization, saving files
for offline synchronization, and running simulation apps that
synchronize geometry.

48 |
LiveLink™ for SOLIDWORKS® Installations

If you have licensed LiveLink™ for SOLIDWORKS®, the installer registers an

add-in for SOLIDWORKS called LiveLink for COMSOL (6.4). This add-in
should appear in the SOLIDWORKS user interface, listed in the Add-Ins dialog,
accessible from the Tools menu.
The add-in provides tools for preparing your SOLIDWORKS design for
simulation with COMSOL Multiphysics. For example, you can create selections
on the geometry and set up dimensional parameters. Those selections and
parameters, together with the geometry, are synchronized with the COMSOL
Multiphysics model.
The add-in enables two modes of setting up simulations based on the
SOLIDWORKS design:
• In one mode you can run SOLIDWORKS and the COMSOL Desktop
side-by-side and synchronize the geometry between the two. This enables
running parametric sweeps, as well as parameter optimizations using an
optimization solver (available with a license for the Optimization Module).
• In offline synchronization mode you can save a synchronization file using
the add-in inside SOLIDWORKS. You can then load the synchronization
file into the COMSOL Desktop running on a different computer from the
CAD software. This enables single synchronizations and parametric sweeps.

If COMSOL Multiphysics cannot connect to SOLIDWORKS,

run the COMSOL Installer to repair the installation (see
[Link]/support/knowledgebase/1221 for
instructions), or manually reregister the add-in by following the
steps from the following link: [Link]/support/
knowledgebase/1122.

You can also install and register the add-in with SOLIDWORKS
by installing the COMSOL Client, available for download from
[Link]. Such an installation enables the functionality
for preparing SOLIDWORKS designs for synchronization, saving
files for offline synchronization, and running simulation apps that
synchronize geometry.

| 49
Cluster Installation

COMSOL Multiphysics supports two mutual modes of parallel operation:

shared-memory parallel operations and distributed-memory parallel operations,
including cluster support. This section is dedicated to distributed-memory parallel
installation.
COMSOL Multiphysics can distribute computations on compute clusters using
the MPI model. One large problem can be distributed across many compute
nodes. Also, parametric sweeps can be distributed with individual parameter cases
distributed to each cluster node.

P REREQUISITES
The cluster installation instructions assume that you have a fully operational and
tested Windows cluster with the Windows Server 2016, Windows Server 2019, or
Windows Server 2022 operating system and that you are a fully qualified system
administrator, with administration access rights to the cluster head node and
compute nodes. A compatible version of Microsoft® HPC Pack for your version
of Windows Server is required.

LICENSE MANAGER
COMSOL Multiphysics requires a Floating Network License for running on
clusters. Please check the license file for the CLUSTERNODE feature, which needs to
be present to enable the cluster computing functionality. The license manager
needs to be accessible from all nodes in the cluster. Therefore it is often a good
idea to have it run on the head node.

INSTALLATION FOLDER
The COMSOL Multiphysics installation folder should be shared between all
compute nodes and the head node. The installation of the COMSOL software is
only needed on the head node. Alternatively, the software can be installed on C:\
on each compute node. Typically, the installation directory is accessed through a
UNC (uniform naming convention) path on the Windows private network that is
only seen by the compute nodes that belong to the cluster.

I NSTALLATION P ROCEDURE
In addition to the normal installation steps as outlined under Installing on
Windows, this section includes specific information for cluster installations.
During installation, on the Products page (see Products Page) ensure that you
select the COMSOL Cluster Components checkbox under Select products to install.

50 |
For the installation directory that you specify in the Destination folder text field,
remember to share the installation directory with the compute nodes after
installation.
If you installed COMSOL Multiphysics on a shared directory, you need to install
Microsoft Visual Studio® runtime libraries on each compute node. (See
[Link]/support/knowledgebase/1083 for instructions.)

ACCESS TO CLUSTER ( WINDOWS SERVER ONLY )

If you work on a desktop PC, install COMSOL on that PC. Before you start, you
need to install Microsoft® HPC Pack on the PC. This software is free and enables
you to access the cluster from your PC.

C HECKING THE I NSTALLATION

After the cluster installation has finished, make the following checks to make sure
that the installation is working:
• Make sure that the COMSOL installation directory is shared between all the
compute nodes and the head node on a shared network disk.
• Make sure that the license manager is reachable from all compute nodes.
- If you have firewalls activated, open any relevant TCP ports for the license
check from the nodes.
- For more information, see [Link]/support/knowledgebase/903
• To check that a node is OK, open a remote desktop session to the compute
node, then start \\headnode\COMSOL\bin\win64\[Link] (assuming
\\headnode\COMSOL is the shared installation directory). If the COMSOL
Desktop starts without license errors, the license management works fine. If
not, check the firewall (see above). If you get other errors, you may need to
install runtime libraries on the compute nodes.
For more information on installing and running COMSOL Multiphysics on
clusters, see Running COMSOL Multiphysics on Clusters and the COMSOL
Multiphysics Reference Manual.

| 51
License Manager Installation on Windows

Depending on your region and operating system, you might be required to install
and run the FlexNet® license manager in order to run COMSOL Multiphysics.

What Is the FlexNet® License Manager?

COMSOL uses the FlexNet® license manager software for license management.
The license manager comes bundled with any COMSOL installation. The
COMSOL software products and the license manager can be installed in any
order, unless you are installing based on a port number and hostname. In that
case, the license manager software needs to be installed and started before
installing COMSOL. You should use the version of the license manager that is
shipped with the newest version of COMSOL installed on your system.
Installation of any paid-for license on Windows requires a license file
([Link]), which is sent to you by a COMSOL representative by email. You
can view the contents of the license file by opening it with a text editor or word
processing software. If the file contains a line starting with the word SERVER,
then the license manager is required. For a Floating Network License, the purpose
of the license manager is to count the number of concurrent users and to give an
error message if the number exceeds the licensed amount. Depending on your
region and operating system, the license manager might also be needed for Single
User Licenses. In that case, the purpose of the license manager is to lock a
COMSOL session to a computer that is authorized by COMSOL.
The FlexNet® license manager software supports a heterogeneous network of
Windows, Linux, and macOS computers. Both the license manager and the
COMSOL software can run on either Windows, Linux, or macOS platforms. In
this context, the computer where the license manager is installed is called the
license server and any computer that has the COMSOL products installed is called
a client. Any type of networked computer can function as a license server, such as
a laptop, desktop, workstation, or centrally located server. COMSOL can be
installed anywhere, typically on a local PC or on a server where users access the
program over the network. A single computer can function as both license server
and client, holding both the license manager and COMSOL.
Even though the license manager and COMSOL can be installed in any order, a
full test of the installation cannot be done until both are installed.

52 |
System Requirements for the FlexNet® License Manager

Before starting the installation process, check that your system meets all necessary
requirements as listed at: [Link]/system-requirements. If you are
running the license manager on a license server where you do not intend to run
the COMSOL software, the system only needs to meet the listed hardware and
operating system requirements. The memory and graphics requirements do not
need to be met because the license manager is not as resource intensive as the
COMSOL software.

A BOUT MAC A DDRESSES

As licenses are based on MAC addresses, MAC address randomization is not
supported.

FlexNet® License Manager Software Components

The license manager consists of four software components:

• License server manager ([Link])
• Vendor daemon ([Link])
• FlexNet utility program ([Link])
• FlexNet Control Panel ([Link])
The license server manager ([Link]) and the vendor daemon ([Link])
run on the license server. When a user starts COMSOL on a client computer,
communication is established through the network from the client to the license
server and the license server manager ([Link]). The license server manager
then makes a request to the vendor daemon ([Link]), which releases
licenses according to information in the [Link] file. The FlexNet utility
program ([Link]) is used for handling license server management tasks, with
the FlexNet Control Panel ([Link]) as its optional graphical user interface.

| 53
FlexNe t ® L i c e n s e M a n a g e r D o c u m e n t a t i o n

For detailed information on the FlexNet® license manager software, select File >
Help > Documentation, and scroll to the bottom of the page to locate a PDF copy
of the FlexNet Publisher License Administration Guide.
You can also find the guide in your installation directory. The default location is
C:\Program Files\COMSOL\COMSOL64\Multiphysics\doc\pdf\COMSOL_Multiphysics\
FlexNet

Note: This PDF file is only available if you have locally installed documentation.

The License File and The License Features

The license file has the same structure on all platforms. In this section, the most
important parts of the license file are explained. Below is an example of the
contents of a [Link] file:
#------------------------------------------------------------------
# COMSOL 6.4 FNL License No: 1234567
# Visit [Link]/install for latest installation instructions
#------------------------------------------------------------------
SERVER [Link] 0050569e1b87 1718
USE_SERVER
VENDOR LMCOMSOL port=1719
FEATURE SERIAL LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent uncounted \
VENDOR_STRING=C,5701108 HOSTID=ANY BORROW=720 SN=1234567 TS_OK \
SIGN=0C3A8BF6722E
INCREMENT COMSOL LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent 4 SUPERSEDE DUP_GROUP=UHD \
ISSUED=6-JUN-2012 BORROW=720 SN=1234567 SIGN=123456789ABC
INCREMENT COMSOLGUI LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent 4 SUPERSEDE DUP_GROUP=UHD \
ISSUED=6-JUN-2012 BORROW=720 SN=1234567 SIGN=123456789ABC
INCREMENT HEATTRANSFER LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent 2 SUPERSEDE \
DUP_GROUP=UHD ISSUED=6-JUN-2012 BORROW=720 SN=1234567 \
SIGN=123456789ABC
INCREMENT CLIENTSERVER LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent 4 SUPERSEDE \
DUP_GROUP=UHD ISSUED=6-JUN-2012 BORROW=720 SN=1234567 \
SIGN=123456789ABC
INCREMENT CLUSTERNODE LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent 4 SUPERSEDE DUP_GROUP=U \
ISSUED=6-JUN-2012 BORROW=720 SN=1234567 SIGN=123456789ABC
INCREMENT COMSOLBATCH LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent 2 SUPERSEDE \
DUP_GROUP=UHD ISSUED=6-JUN-2012 BORROW=720 SN=1234567 \
SIGN=123456789ABC
INCREMENT HEATTRANSFERBATCH LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent 2 SUPERSEDE \
DUP_GROUP=UHD ISSUED=6-JUN-2012 BORROW=720 SN=1234567 \
SIGN=123456789ABC

54 |
THE COMMENT LINES
Comment lines can be included in the license file by starting them with the hash
symbol #. These lines have no effect on the license server or client.

THE SERVER LINE

In the [Link] file, the line starting with SERVER should contain:
• The hostname of the license server. In the example above, the hostname is
[Link]. This name can be edited by the user.
• The hostid of the license server. In the example above, the hostid is
0050569e1b87. This number cannot be edited by the user.
• A port number. In the example above, the port number is 1718. This
number can be edited by the user.
Confirm that the license server hostname is the actual name of your license server
(the computer that you intend to run the license manager on); otherwise, change
it by editing the file. The default port number (1718) can be changed if another
program is already using it (you will get an error message indicating this when
starting the license manager). If the default port number 1718 is in use, change it
to any other number between 1025 and 64,000.

THE USE _ SERVER LINE

The USE_SERVER line, with no arguments, does not impact the license manager but
has implications for the client. When a COMSOL client sees the USE_SERVER line,
it ignores everything in the license file except the preceding SERVER lines and
transfers checkout validation to the vendor daemon. This means that if you are
running COMSOL on one computer, and the license manager on a different
computer, your license file can only contain two lines: the SERVER line and the
USE_SERVER line.

THE VENDOR LINE

The VENDOR line defines the name of the LMCOMSOL vendor daemon. This name
cannot be changed. The vendor daemon is a process that has to be running
together with the license manager and is automatically started when the license
manager is started. The LMCOMSOL vendor daemon requires its own port number.
In the example above, the default port number 1719 is shown.
If the license manager is running on a computer with an active firewall and the
COMSOL client is outside of that firewall, at least two port numbers must be
opened up in the license server’s firewall to allow client computers to connect to
the license manager and the vendor daemon.

| 55
Using the example license file above, configure the firewall to allow access to the
port numbers 1718 and 1719. If you have chosen other port numbers and
modified the [Link] file accordingly, configure the firewall to allow access to
your chosen port numbers. If you are unsure about which port numbers are free
or how to enable firewall port access, contact your system administrator.
You cannot modify anything in the [Link] file except the license server name
and (if necessary) port numbers, or the license might not work.

THE SERIAL LINE

The SERIAL line contains information on the license type, license number, and the
products included in the license.

THE INCREMENT AND FEATURE LINES , AND L ICENSE F EATURES

The INCREMENT or FEATURE lines contain a license feature name, version, expiration
date, and the number of available licenses. The example file above shows that the
user has a perpetual (permanent) COMSOL 6.4 Floating Network License
allowing four concurrent users of COMSOL Multiphysics and two concurrent
users of the Heat Transfer Module. Borrowing is enabled and BORROW=720 sets a
time limit to 720 hours. “SN=” shows the license’s serial number. The number
after “SIGN=” at the end of each INCREMENT line contains a license key. Long lines
can be broken by a continuation character (\).
The License Feature Names
The following table contains the license feature names for all products in the
COMSOL 6.4 product suite (see also additional information about license
features below the table):

PRODUCT FEATURE NAME

COMSOL Multiphysics COMSOL, COMSOLUSER, COMSOLGUI,

MODELMANAGERa, CHATBOTb
COMSOL Multiphysics Floating Network CLIENTSERVER, CLUSTERNODE,
Licensec MODELMANAGERSERVER

COMSOL Server COMSOLSERVER, COMSOLUSER

COMSOL Compiler COMSOLCOMPILER
AC/DC Module ACDC
Acoustics Module ACOUSTICS
Battery Design Module BATTERYDESIGN
CAD Import Module CADIMPORT, CADREADER,
CADIMPORTUSER

56 |
PRODUCT FEATURE NAME

CFD Module CFD

Chemical Reaction Engineering Module CHEM
Composite Materials Module COMPOSITEMATERIALS
Corrosion Module CORROSION
Design Module DESIGN, CADIMPORT,
CADIMPORTUSER, CADREADER
ECAD Import Module ECADIMPORT
Electric Discharge Module ELECTRICDISCHARGE
Electrochemistry Module ELECTROCHEMISTRY
Electrodeposition Module ELECTRODEPOSITION
Fatigue Module FATIGUE
File Import for CATIA V5 CATIA5
Fuel Cell & Electrolyzer Module FUELCELLANDELECTROLYZER
Geomechanics Module GEOMECHANICS
Granular Flow Module GRANULARFLOW
Heat Transfer Module HEATTRANSFER
Liquid & Gas Properties Module LIQUIDANDGASPROPERTIES
LiveLink™ for AutoCAD® LLAUTOCAD, CADIMPORT, CADREADER
LiveLink™ for PTC® Creo® Parametric™ LLCREOPARAMETRIC, CADIMPORT,
CADREADER
LiveLink™ for Excel® LLEXCEL
LiveLink™ for Inventor® LLINVENTOR, CADIMPORT,
CADREADER
LiveLink™ for MATLAB® LLMATLAB
LiveLink™ for Revit® LLREVIT, CADIMPORT, CADREADER
LiveLink™ for Simulink® LLSIMULINK
LiveLink™ for Solid Edge® LLSOLIDEDGE, CADIMPORT,
CADREADER
LiveLink™ for SOLIDWORKS® LLSOLIDWORKS, CADIMPORT,
CADREADER
Material Library MATLIB
MEMS Module MEMS
Metal Processing Module METALPROCESSING
Microfluidics Module MICROFLUIDICS

| 57
PRODUCT FEATURE NAME

Mixer Module MIXER

Molecular Flow Module MOLECULARFLOW
Multibody Dynamics Module MULTIBODYDYNAMICS
Nonlinear Structural Materials Module NONLINEARSTRUCTMATERIALS
Optimization Module OPTIM
Particle Tracing Module PARTICLETRACING
Pipe Flow Module PIPEFLOW
Plasma Module PLASMA
Polymer Flow Module POLYMERFLOW
Porous Media Flow Module POROUSMEDIAFLOW
Ray Optics Module RAYOPTICS
RF Module RF
Rotordynamics Module ROTORDYNAMICS
Semiconductor Module SEMICONDUCTOR
Structural Mechanics Module STRUCTURALMECHANICS
Subsurface Flow Module SUBSURFACEFLOW
Uncertainty Quantification Module UQ
Wave Optics Module WAVEOPTICS
a. Not included in Class Kit licenses.
b. Adds chatbot components for communication with an AI system.
c. Additional license features for COMSOL Multiphysics when installed using a floating network license
(FNL).

COMSOL M ULTIPHYSICS L ICENSE F EATURES

Each COMSOL Desktop process checks out a COMSOL feature, a COMSOLUSER
feature, and a COMSOLGUI feature. The COMSOLGUI feature is checked out by a
COMSOL Desktop process. The COMSOL feature is checked out by all COMSOL
Multiphysics processes, whether it has a GUI or not. The COMSOLUSER feature is
checked out to count the number of distinct COMSOL Multiphysics users.
When you use functionality that requires an add-on product, license features
corresponding to that product will be checked out.
If you run an attached batch job from COMSOL Desktop, the COMSOL feature and
add-on product features are passed along from COMSOL Desktop to the batch
job. When the batch job is finished, or when you detach from the batch job,
COMSOL Desktop takes back the licenses.

58 |
When you run distributed jobs on a cluster, the CLUSTERNODE feature is checked out
from each node.

COMSOL M ULTIPHYSICS B ATCH L ICENSE F EATURES

For floating network licenses, a separate set of batch features are available for
COMSOL Multiphysics and the licensed add-on products. This means that you in
some cases can continue to use COMSOL Multiphysics locally while running
batch jobs on remote computers and clusters.
With COMSOL Desktop, you can use batch features by selecting the Use batch
license checkbox in the Cluster Sweep and Cluster Computing nodes. From the
command line, you can use the option -usebatchlic to use batch license features.
Batch jobs will check out a batch feature, and when you use functionality that
requires an add-on product, batch features corresponding to that product will be
checked out as well.
The name of the batch feature for COMSOL Multiphysics is COMSOLBATCH, and for
an add-on product it is, for example, RFBATCH for the RF Module. In general,
BATCH is appended to the feature name corresponding to the add-on product.
A concurrent user can run an unlimited number of distinct batch processes using
a single license as long as the models in those jobs only differ by parameter values,
as defined in the Model Builder under Global Definitions > Parameters. This is
implemented by computing a hash value based on model object features using the
hash value as vendor value for the DUP_GROUP=UV keyword.
The CLUSTERNODE feature is checked out when batch features are used. When you
run distributed jobs on a cluster, the CLUSTERNODE feature is also checked out from
each node.

COMSOL M ULTIPHYSICS S ERVER L ICENSE F EATURES

A COMSOL Multiphysics server process will not check out any license features
until you connect to it. When you connect using only the COMSOL API it will
check out a COMSOL feature and a COMSOLUSER feature, as well as features
corresponding to the add-on products that you use. If you connect to the
COMSOL Multiphysics server from COMSOL Desktop, all license features that
have been checked out from the desktop will be passed from COMSOL Desktop
to the COMSOL Multiphysics server, including the COMSOLGUI feature. When you
disconnect from the COMSOL Multiphysics server, the license features will be
passed back from the server to COMSOL Desktop.
In addition to the above, when you connect to a COMSOL Multiphysics server
from a remote computer, the COMSOL Multiphysics server checks out a
CLIENTSERVER feature. The CLIENTSERVER feature is available for floating network

| 59
licenses. When you run distributed jobs on a cluster, the CLUSTERNODE feature is
checked out from each node.

CAD-S PECIFIC L ICENSE F EATURES

For add-on products that use the CAD kernel, the CADIMPORT feature is always
checked out, in addition to the feature corresponding to the add-on product. For
example, when you use the Design Module, the CADIMPORT feature is checked out
in addition to the DESIGN feature.
The CADIMPORTUSER feature is checked out to count the number of distinct
CADIMPORT users, including Desktop users and batch users for floating network
licenses.
Under certain circumstances a single CADREADER feature may also be checked out
when using CAD functionality.

C LASS K IT L ICENSE F EATURES

If you have a Class Kit license for academic use, and enable it by using the -ckl
option, CKL features will be checked out.
The name of the Class Kit license feature for COMSOL Multiphysics is COMSOLCKL,
and for add-on products it is, for example, RFCKL for the RF Module. In general,
CKL is appended to the feature name for the corresponding add-on product.

COMSOL S ERVER L ICENSE F EATURES

Each COMSOL Server process checks out a COMSOLSERVER feature and there is no
limitation on the number of such checkouts. When you start running applications
with COMSOL Server, the server checks out CSL and CSLU features corresponding
to the add-on products. The CSL features are used to allow each user to run four
applications, and the CSLU features are used to count the number of users.
The COMSOLUSERCSL feature will also be checked out to keep track of distinct
COMSOL Server users.
The name of the COMSOL Server feature for COMSOL Multiphysics is
COMSOLCSL, and for add-on products it is, for example, RFCSL for the RF Module.
In general, CSL is appended to the feature name for the corresponding add-on
product.
The name of the COMSOL Server user feature for COMSOL Multiphysics is
COMSOLCSLU, and for add-on products it is, for example, RFCSLU for the RF Module.
In general, CSLU is appended to the feature name for the corresponding add-on
product.

60 |
COMSOL S ERVER B ATCH J OB L ICENSE F EATURES
You can launch batch jobs from applications run with COMSOL Server. Batch
jobs can only be started from running applications and not from the command
line. The application always uses COMSOL Server batch license features. The
batch jobs will check out a COMSOLUSERCSL feature as well.
The name of the batch feature for COMSOL Server is COMSOLBACSL, and for
add-on products it is, for example, RFBACSL for the RF Module. In general, BACSL
is appended to the feature name for the corresponding add-on product.
A concurrent user can run an unlimited number of distinct batch processes using
a single license as long as the models in those jobs only differ by parameter values,
as defined in the Model Builder under Global Definitions > Parameters. This is
implemented by computing a hash value based on model object features using the
hash value as vendor value for the DUP_GROUP=UV keyword.
The COMSOLUSERCSL feature will also be checked out to keep track of distinct
COMSOL Server batch job users.
The CLUSTERNODECSL feature is checked out when the BACSL license features are
used. When you run distributed jobs on a cluster, the CLUSTERNODECSL feature is
also checked out from each node.

COMSOL C OMPILER L ICENSE F EATURES

A COMSOL Compiler license enables you to compile stand-alone applications
based on models created with COMSOL Multiphysics and most add-on products.
When you use COMSOL Compiler, compiler license features for COMSOL
Multiphysics and all allowed add-on products are checked out.
The name of the compiler feature for COMSOL Multiphysics is COMSOLCOMPILER,
and for add-on products it is, for example, RFCOMPL for the RF Module. In general,
COMPL is appended to the feature name for the corresponding add-on product.

I DLE T IMEOUT OF L ICENSES

For information about the TIMEOUT and TIMEOUTALL settings, see the FlexNet
Publisher License Administration Guide. See also the following section.

C ONFIGURING F LEX N ET L ICENSE F EATURES

It is possible for the license administrator to configure how the license manager
handles license features. To do so, create an options file (usually called
[Link]) in the format described in the FlexNet Publisher License
Administration Guide. Additionally, COMSOL has made the following decisions
that cannot be overridden by the license administrator:
• VENDOR_STRING is used for determining license pools.

| 61
• Borrowed licenses can be returned early.
• Fully qualified domain name matching is not used.
• Minimum LINGER time is 0.
• TIMEOUT is supported. The minimum idle time is 900 seconds (15 minutes).
If TIMEOUT or TIMEOUTALL is not specified, idle licenses are never timed out.
• Each new license request scans all the license servers.
• The FLEXLM_DIAGNOSTICS environment variable is supported.
• The LM_LICENSE_FILE and LMCOMSOL_LICENSE_FILE environment variables are
supported, except when running the installer, since the installer needs full
control of which license file is being used. Note that COMSOL internally
sets LMCOMSOL_LICENSE_FILE to COMSOL64/Multiphysics/license/[Link]
if LMCOMSOL_LICENSE_FILE has not already been set by the user.
• License files are not case sensitive.

Installing the License Manager

The license manager components are automatically installed when installing

COMSOL Multiphysics unless otherwise specified on the Products page of the
COMSOL Installer; see Products Page. In some cases, the license manager is also
automatically configured to run as a service. The checkbox for the license manager

62 |
components can be found last in the list of software components, as seen in the
picture below:

If you do not intend to run the license manager on the computer for which you
are installing COMSOL software products, you can clear this checkbox during
installation.
If you want to install COMSOL on the same computer as the license manager, first
perform a complete COMSOL installation including the license manager software
components. When finished, skip the remainder of this section and continue with
Starting the License Manager.
To install only the license manager, follow the installation instructions for
COMSOL earlier in this document and, on the Products page, clear all
checkboxes except the one for the license manager.

AUTOMATED LICENSE MANAGER INSTALLATION

The license manager can also be installed via the automated installation process;
see Automated Installation. Set licmanager = 1 in the answer file to install the
license manager. To automatically configure the license manager to run as a service
on Windows, use [Link] = 1 in the [Link] file and
provide values for the other [Link].* lines.

| 63
S ta r t i n g t h e L i c e n s e M a n a g e r

The license manager can be started manually, or it can be configured to start

automatically as a service each time the computer is rebooted.

The installer can set up the license manager to start automatically;

if it did, you can skip the following section.

STARTING THE MANAGER AUTOMATICALLY AS A SERVICE

To set up the license manager as a service from the FlexNet Control Panel
(LMTOOLS):
1 Locate the COMSOL64\Multiphysics\license\win64 folder and run
[Link]. Alternatively, run LMTOOLS from the Windows Start menu,
available under COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 > COMSOL Launchers > LMTOOLS.
2 On the Service/License File page choose Configuration using Services.
3 Click the Configure Services tab.

4 Make an entry in the Service Name field, for example, COMSOL License Manager.
5 Specify the full paths to [Link] and [Link] by browsing to their
locations on your hard drive. The default location for [Link] is C:\Program
Files\COMSOL\COMSOL64\Multiphysics\license\win64\[Link], and for the
license file, it is
C:\Program Files\COMSOL\COMSOL64\Multiphysics\license\[Link]. For
the debug log file, you can use any name of your choice, for example,

64 |
 [Link]. The default file path to the location of the license manager debug
log file is C:\ProgramData\COMSOL\[Link].

Make sure your Windows user account has read/write permissions

for the folder of the debug log file, or the file will not be created.

6 Select the Use Services checkbox (might not be possible on all platforms, but is
recommended when available) and then the Start Server at Power Up checkbox.
7 Click Save Service. The license manager now starts at automatically when you
reboot the license server computer. If you want to start the license manager
right away without restarting the license server computer, click Start Server on
the Start/Stop/Reread page of the FlexNet Control Panel.

S TARTING THE LICENSE MANAGER MANUALLY

To start the license manager manually, browse to the license\win64 folder. Now,
in a Windows command window enter
lmgrd -c ..\[Link] -l ..\[Link]

The license manager is now ready to distribute licenses over the network. It writes
debug information to the log file COMSOL64\Multiphysics\license\[Link].

Verifying That the Lice n s e M a n a g e r I s R u n n i n g

Once you start the license manager, it is good practice to verify that the license
manager service is running. Start the Windows Task Manager and go to the
Services page. Check that the LMCOMSOL service is running.

Starting COMSOL Multiphysics

After the installation is complete and the license server manager and vendor
daemon are running on the license server, you can start using the COMSOL
products. For more information on how to run COMSOL Multiphysics, see
Running COMSOL Multiphysics on Windows.

| 65
Changing the License

If you have received a new license file — for example, when adding COMSOL
products to an existing license — replace the current license file with the new one.
Double-check the contents of this file to make sure it lists the products that the
license includes. See also The License Feature Names.

When the license file has changed, you must restart the license
manager or reread the license file; otherwise, it continues to use
the old license file still in memory.

RESTARTING THE LICENSE MANAGER

To restart the license manager, follow these steps:
1 In the Windows Start menu, choose COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 >
COMSOL Launchers > LMTOOLS.
2 In the FlexNet Control Panel, click, in this order, Stop Server and Start Server.

OBTAINING A HOSTID
If you need to verify the hostid of the license server, you can follow the steps for
Obtaining the Hostid. Alternatively, if COMSOL is already installed on the license
server, you can determine the hostid by running the lmhostid command
COMSOL64/Multiphysics/license/win64/lmutil lmhostid

The hostid is typically the Ethernet address (also called a MAC address) of the
network card. An Ethernet address has six bytes, each with two hexadecimal digits,
giving a hostid with twelve hexadecimal digits. Alternatively, the hostid can be the
volume serial number of your C hard drive. The volume serial number has 4 bytes,
each with two hexadecimal digits, giving a hostid with eight hexadecimal digits.

Using COMSOL on an IPv6 Network

COMSOL has been tested on both IPv6-only networks and hybrid IPv4/IPv6
networks. To make sure that the license manager uses IPv6, set the environment
variable FNP_IP_PRIORITY to 6. See the FlexNet Publisher License Administration
Guide for details.

66 |
Tr o uble s ho o t ing Lic en se Er r o r s

If you have questions or problems with your installation, see Troubleshooting

License Errors.

| 67
Running COMSOL Multiphysics on Windows

After the installation is finished, a COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 folder is created on

the Windows Start menu. Additionally, a COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 shortcut
icon is placed on the Windows desktop:

To start COMSOL Multiphysics, double-click the desktop icon or select

COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 from the Windows Start menu.

C ROSS -P LATFORM U SER I NTERFACE

The default user interface for COMSOL is a Windows application. There is also a
cross-platform user interface that you can start by going to the bin\win64 folder
in the COMSOL installation directory and double-clicking [Link]. The
cross-platform user interface is identical to the interface on Linux and macOS.

The COMSOL Multiphysics Folder on The Start Menu

Depending on which COMSOL products and software components you have

licensed and installed, the COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 folder on the Windows
Start menu contains a selection of the items in the following list:
• COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4: Starts the COMSOL Desktop.
• COMSOL Documentation: Starts the COMSOL Documentation window,
from which you can access and search all the installed documentation. By
default, the PDF documents open inside the COMSOL Documentation
application; to instead open them in Adobe Acrobat, you need to modify
browser settings for the Adobe PDF Reader add-on.

68 |
• COMSOL Launchers: Opens a folder with launchers for the following
additional COMSOL programs and utilities:
- Setup: Starts the COMSOL Setup program, which you can use to add,
remove, and repair COMSOL products and to change the license.
- Uninstall: Starts the COMSOL Uninstaller. For more information, see
Removing (Uninstalling) the COMSOL Installation.
- Update: Starts the COMSOL Installer in update mode.
- COMSOL Multiphysics Client 6.4: Starts a COMSOL Multiphysics client
that can be connected to a COMSOL Multiphysics server.
- COMSOL Multiphysics Server 6.4: Starts a COMSOL Multiphysics server
that a COMSOL Multiphysics client can connect to.
For more information on running COMSOL in client–server mode, see
Running COMSOL Multiphysics in Client–Server Mode.
- LMTOOLS: Starts the FlexNet license manager control panel (LMTOOLS).
For more information, see License Manager Installation on Windows.
- For launching COMSOL Multiphysics with any of the available graphics
rendering options — OpenGL® and software rendering — the following
shortcuts are available: COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 (OpenGL), and
COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 (Software).
- This folder also contains launchers for COMSOL Multiphysics, COMSOL
Documentation, COMSOL with MATLAB (if available), and COMSOL
with Simulink (if available) which appear on the main COMSOL
Multiphysics 6.4 Start menu.

S t a r t i n g C O M S O L M u l t i p h y s i c s f o r a C l a s s k i t L ic e n s e

If you have a Classkit License, start COMSOL Multiphysics by double-clicking the

dedicated Windows desktop icon:

| 69
Cr ea ting De sk top S h o r t c u t s M a n u a l l y

Sometimes it is necessary to create the COMSOL shortcuts manually, for example,

when COMSOL Multiphysics is installed on a shared network drive.
1 Locate the COMSOL executable. Its default location is
C:\Program Files\COMSOL\COMSOL64\Multiphysics\bin\win64\[Link]

2 Right-click [Link] and select Create shortcut, which creates a shortcut with
a default name [Link] - Shortcut. If this shortcut is not created on the
Desktop, then move it there by drag-and-drop.

C REATING A D ESKTOP S HORTCUT M ANUALLY FOR THE C ROSS -P LATFORM

U SER I NTERFACE
The cross-platform user interface for COMSOL that is available on macOS and
Linux has a slightly different look-and-feel than the user interface for Windows.
You can get access to the cross-platform user interface from
C:\Program Files\COMSOL\COMSOL64\Multiphysics\bin\win64\[Link]

assuming that the default installation location has not changed by you during
installation.
To create a shortcut to the cross-platform user interface, right-click [Link]
and select Create shortcut, which creates a shortcut with a default name
[Link] - Shortcut. If this shortcut is not created on the Desktop, then move
it there by drag-and-drop.

C REATING D ESKTOP S HORTCUTS M ANUALLY FOR A C LASSKIT L ICENSE

If you manually create a desktop shortcut for a Classkit License, then, in addition
to the steps above, the shortcut’s Target needs to be modified with additional
options. Right-click the COMSOL shortcut icon and select Properties. Change the
text string in the Target field to
"C:\Program Files\COMSOL\COMSOL64\Multiphysics\bin\win64\[Link]"
-[Link]
"C:\Program Files\COMSOL\COMSOL64\Multiphysics\bin\win64\
[Link]"

(The complete text string must be written on a single row with spaces between the
command and each argument.)
Here, C:\Program Files\COMSOL\COMSOL64\Multiphysics represents the default
COMSOL installation directory. This can be changed in the Target field text
string if your installation is placed in a different folder.

70 |
C REATING D ESKTOP S HORTCUTS M ANUALLY FOR COMSOL WITH
MATLAB
If you manually create a desktop shortcut for a COMSOL with MATLAB, then,
in addition to the steps above, the shortcut’s Target needs to be modified with
additional options. Right-click the COMSOL shortcut icon and select Properties.
Change the text string in the Target field to
"C:\Program
Files\COMSOL\COMSOL64\Multiphysics\bin\win64\[Link]" matlab

(The complete text string must be written on a single row with spaces between the
command and each argument.)
Here, C:\Program Files\COMSOL\COMSOL64\Multiphysics represents the default
COMSOL installation directory and this can be changed in the Target field text
string if your installation is placed in a different folder.

C REATING D ESKTOP S HORTCUTS M ANUALLY FOR COMSOL WITH S IMULINK

If you manually create a desktop shortcut for a COMSOL with Simulink, then, in
addition to the steps above, the shortcut’s Target needs to be modified with
additional options. Right-click the COMSOL shortcut icon and select Properties.
Change the text string in the Target field to
"C:\Program
Files\COMSOL\COMSOL64\Multiphysics\bin\win64\[Link]" simulink

(The complete text string must be written on a single row with spaces between the
command and each argument.)
Here, C:\Program Files\COMSOL\COMSOL64\Multiphysics represents the default
COMSOL installation directory and this can be changed in the Target field text
string if your installation is placed in a different folder.

R u n n i n g C O M S O L M u l t i p h ys i c s i n C l i e n t – S e r v e r M o d e

When you start COMSOL Multiphysics by, for example, double-clicking the
Windows desktop icon, COMSOL Multiphysics is run as a single application that
includes both the COMSOL Multiphysics client and COMSOL Multiphysics
server, as explained later in this section. However, the COMSOL client–server
architecture lets you access the COMSOL Multiphysics server — the COMSOL
computational engine — as a separate process. For example, the COMSOL

| 71
Desktop can act as a COMSOL Multiphysics client when connected to a
COMSOL Multiphysics server.

The license server is not the same as a COMSOL Multiphysics

server. The license manager can run on a computer different from
both the ones used by COMSOL Desktop and COMSOL
Multiphysics server.

You need a Floating Network License to run the COMSOL Multiphysics server
and the COMSOL Multiphysics client on separate computers. However, any
COMSOL license is sufficient for running client and server on the same computer.
The client and server need not run on the same platform. For example, you can
run the COMSOL Desktop on Windows connecting to a COMSOL Multiphysics
server on a Linux or macOS computer. This enables offloading heavy-duty
computations from your personal laptop or desktop to run just the COMSOL
Desktop graphical user interface. A typical use would be to run the COMSOL
Multiphysics server on a computer with large amounts of memory (RAM) and
processing power and to use your personal computer for pre- and postprocessing
with the COMSOL Desktop.

STARTING A COMSOL M ULTIPHYSICS SERVER

The COMSOL Multiphysics server is a single user server allowing multiple
sessions by the same user, one session at a time. To start a COMSOL Multiphysics
server, click COMSOL Multiphysics Server in the COMSOL Launchers folder underneath
your COMSOL Multiphysics folder on the Windows Start menu. When you start
a COMSOL Multiphysics server from the Windows Start menu, a command
window appears asking you for a username and password. You can use any
username and password of your choice, it is only used for connecting a COMSOL
Multiphysics client with a COMSOL Multiphysics server.

When the COMSOL Multiphysics server starts, it listens for a COMSOL

Multiphysics client connection on the port listed in the command window. In the
example above it is port 2036.

72 |
CONNECTING A COMSOL CLIENT TO A COMSOL M ULTIPHYSICS SERVER
You can start a COMSOL Multiphysics client session by clicking COMSOL
Multiphysics Client in the COMSOL Launcher folder underneath your COMSOL
Multiphysics folder on the Windows Start menu. You can also connect to a
COMSOL Multiphysics server from the COMSOL Desktop by selecting File >
Connect to Server. When you start the Client, a Connect to Server window appears
prompting you for a computer name (Server) where the COMSOL Multiphysics
server is running, Port number, Username, and Password.

Once you have filled out this information and clicked OK, the COMSOL
Multiphysics server command window indicates that a COMSOL Multiphysics
client has connected. For more information on running COMSOL in client–server
mode, see the COMSOL Multiphysics Reference Manual.

R u n n i n g C O M S O L M u l t i p h ys i c s i n B a t c h M o d e

You can submit COMSOL Multiphysics batch jobs from the COMSOL Desktop
and the command line.
To run a COMSOL Multiphysics batch job from the COMSOL Desktop, you
need to make the Batch feature visible: in the Model Builder tree, click the Show
More Options button ( ) and select Batch and Cluster in the Show More Options
dialog. In the Model Builder, right-click a Study node and select Batch to create
batch jobs.
From the Windows command window, you can start batch jobs by using the
comsolbatchcommand. For example:
comsolbatch -inputfile [Link] -outputfile [Link]

To run a specific study add the command line option -study <tag>, where <tag>
is the tag of the study to run, for instance, std1. To see the tag, click the toolbar
button Model Tree Node Text in the Model Builder and select Tag.

| 73
The COMSOL Multiphysics Reference Manual has a dedicated section on
running COMSOL Multiphysics from the Windows command window, including
a list of COMSOL commands and associated syntax.

Multicore Settings

COMSOL Multiphysics supports two modes of parallel operation:

shared-memory parallel operations and distributed-memory parallel operations,
including cluster support. This section covers shared-memory processing, or
multithreading, which is important for the performance of COMSOL
Multiphysics computations. Some terms that are frequently used when describing
multithreading are:
• Core: The core is a processor core used in shared-memory parallelism by a
computational node with multiple processors.
• Speedup is how many times faster a job runs on N cores compared to 1 core,
on a specific compute node. The speedup depends on the simulation type,
the hardware used, and hardware drivers used.
In Windows, the default number of processor cores used by COMSOL
Multiphysics is the total number of available physical cores. For example, if you
have a 2 x dual core machine, 4 cores are used in parallel by a COMSOL
Multiphysics process.
To find out how many processor cores your Windows machine has:
1 Start the Windows Task Manager (press Ctrl+Shift+Esc, or right-click the
taskbar and select Task Manager in the context menu).
2 On the Performance page, click CPU. The number of cores can be seen as the
number next to Cores.
If you want COMSOL Multiphysics to leave out one or more processor cores, you
can set the number of cores used for a computational job in the Preferences
window on the Computing > Multicore page (by first selecting the Number of cores
checkbox and then entering the number of processor cores to use).
You can also change the default behavior of COMSOL Multiphysics by setting the
environment variable COMSOL_NUM_THREADS to the desired number of cores. See the
COMSOL Multiphysics Reference Manual for more information.

74 |
R u n n i n g C O M S O L M u l t i p h ys i c s o n C l u s t e r s

You can launch COMSOL cluster jobs from the COMSOL Desktop and the
command line. To run COMSOL Multiphysics on a cluster, you need to make the
cluster features visible: in the Model Builder tree, click the Show More Options
button ( ) and select Batch and Cluster in the Show More Options dialog. Then,
in the Model Builder, right-click a Study node and select Cluster Computing or
Cluster Sweep to create cluster jobs. Cluster computing requires a Floating
Network License.
The following terms occur frequently when describing the hardware for cluster
computing and shared-memory parallel computing:
• Compute node: The compute nodes are where the distributed computing
occurs. Each distributed COMSOL process resides in a compute node and
communicates with other compute nodes using MPI (message-passing
interface).
• Host: The host is a physical machine (hardware) with a network adapter and
unique network address. The host is part of the cluster. It is sometimes
referred to as a physical node.
• Core: The core is a processor core used in shared-memory parallelism by a
computational node with multiple processors.
The number of hosts and the number of compute nodes are usually the same. For
some special problem types, like very small problems with many parameters, it
might be beneficial to use more than one computational node on one host.
A tutorial for cluster testing is included in the Application Libraries window under
COMSOL Multiphysics/Cluster_and_Batch_Tutorials/micromixer_cluster.

R UNNING F ROM A D ESKTOP PC

To access the COMSOL Multiphysics running on a cluster, it is recommended to
work on a desktop PC. To do so, use one of the following options:
• Install COMSOL Multiphysics on your local PC. Also install the client
portion of Microsoft HPC Pack on the desktop PC. Use a version that is
compatible with the version of Windows Server that is installed on the
cluster. Microsoft HPC Pack enables you to access the cluster from your
workstation.
• Alternatively, connect to the head node via a remote desktop connection and
start COMSOL Multiphysics on the head node.

| 75
QUICK TROUBLESHOOTING
• Your first step is to make sure you have the latest release installed. Check that
you have COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 or later. Also make sure to install the
latest product updates.
• For Windows HPC Server, log in to each node with remote desktop and
start the COMSOL Desktop GUI. No error messages should be displayed.
• If you get the error message “Process status indicates that process is
running,” then cancel any running jobs in the Windows HPCS Job manager
or other scheduler that you use. In the COMSOL Desktop, locate the
External Process page at the lower-right. Click the Clear Status button.
For more information about how to run COMSOL Multiphysics in parallel on
Windows clusters, see the COMSOL Multiphysics Reference Manual. For
installation on Clusters, see Cluster Installation.

R u n n i n g C O M S O L M u l t i p h ys i c s o n t h e C l o u d

COMSOL Multiphysics and COMSOL Server support cloud computing. See

• [Link]/partners-consultants/hpc
• [Link]/model/
running-the-comsol-software-with-amazon-ec2-14075
• [Link]/model/
running-the-comsol-software-with-microsoft-azure-89751

R u n n i n g C O M S O L M u l t i p h ys i c s w i t h M A T L A B

Running COMSOL Multiphysics with MATLAB requires a LiveLink™

for MATLAB® license. To run COMSOL Multiphysics with MATLAB,
double-click the COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 with MATLAB icon on the desktop.

76 |
Alternatively, start COMSOL Multiphysics with MATLAB from the Start menu
by pointing to Programs, then to COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4, and then select
COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 with MATLAB.
Running COMSOL Multiphysics with MATLAB starts a COMSOL Multiphysics
server and a MATLAB Desktop. The COMSOL Desktop is not started. You can
change the path to the MATLAB installation in the Preferences window accessed
from the Options menu of the COMSOL Desktop. For more information, see the
LiveLink™ for MATLAB® documentation.

STARTING COMSOL M ULTIPHYSICS WITH MATLAB USING THE GRAPHICS

SERVER
To display the plot in a COMSOL graphics window you need to run COMSOL
Multiphysics with MATLAB using the graphics server. To do so, append the flag
-graphics to the COMSOL Multiphysics with MATLAB target path.

R u n n i n g C O M S O L M u l t i p h ys i c s w i t h S i m u l i n k

Running COMSOL Multiphysics with Simulink requires a LiveLink™

for Simulink® license. To run COMSOL Multiphysics with Simulink, double-click
the COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 with Simulink icon on the desktop.

Alternatively, start COMSOL Multiphysics with Simulink from the Start menu by
pointing to Programs, then to COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4, and then select
COMSOL Multiphysics 6.4 with Simulink.
Running COMSOL Multiphysics with Simulink starts a COMSOL Multiphysics
server and a MATLAB Desktop. The COMSOL Desktop is not started.
You can change the path to the MATLAB installation in the Preferences window
accessed from the Options menu of the COMSOL Desktop. For more
information, see the LiveLink™ for Simulink® documentation.

| 77
Installing on macOS

I n s ta l l at i o n O v e r th e I n te r n e t

INSTALLATION OF A TRIAL LICENSE OVER THE I NTERNET

A trial license can be given to you with the intention to test the software without
any payment obligation for noncommercial and nonproduction use. This option
is not available in all regions.
Installation of a Single User Trial License requires a license passcode. A passcode
has a form similar to:
FFFFFFFF-TYUS-123456-1234567-123456789

This is usually sent to you by your COMSOL representative by email. Once you
locate your passcode, follow these steps to prepare for download and installation:
1 Click the link for downloading the software as given in the software download
email from your COMSOL representative. This link is identical or similar to:
[Link]/product-download.
2 If you have not already created a COMSOL Access account, you are prompted
to create it. When you have created the account, you can enter your license
passcode to associate it with your account information.
If you already created a COMSOL Access account, you can associate the license
file with your account on the COMSOL Access page under Manage Licenses at
[Link]/access/licenses.
3 Follow the web-based instructions to download the software.
4 Continue with the instructions in the section Downloading and Installing the
COMSOL Software.
A license passcode can also be used for class kit licenses (CKL).

INSTALLATION OF A PAID - FOR LICENSE OVER THE I NTERNET

Installation of any paid-for license on macOS requires a license file that is sent to
you by your COMSOL representative by email. To be able to generate the license
file, information about your hardware is needed in the form of a hostid (host ID).
The hostid is used to lock the license to your hardware and needs to be sent by
you to a COMSOL representative prior to the license file being generated.

78 |
Obtaining the Hostid
Follow these steps to obtain a hostid:
1 From the Apple menu, open System Settings and select Network.
2 Select the correct network adapter and then click Details....
3 Select the Hardware tab where you will find the MAC address listed.
4 If there are multiple network adapters, report the MAC address for all of them.
These numbers should each consist of 12 characters.

Obtaining the Hostname

If you have been informed by your COMSOL representative that you need to run
a license manager for your installation, then you also need the hostname. To get
the hostname, launch the Terminal application and run the hostname command.
If your network administrator has set a fixed IP address for your computer, this IP
Address can be used in place of the hostname. For more information on license
manager installation, see License Manager Installation on macOS.

| 79
Obtaining the License File from a COMSOL Representative
Send the hostid information, as well as hostname, if applicable, in an email to your
COMSOL representative, who will respond with an email including an attached
license file ([Link]). Save this file to your local Home folder to ensure that
the COMSOL installer will be able to read it during the installation process. Avoid
protected folders such as Desktop, Documents, and Downloads.
Below is an example of the contents of a [Link] file for a Single User License
on macOS. The license file is a text file, and this example shows that the licensed
products are COMSOL Multiphysics, Particle Tracing Module, Subsurface Flow
Module, and LiveLink™ for Excel®.
#------------------------------------------------------------------
# COMSOL 6.4 NSL License No: 1234567 Windows/Mac
# Visit [Link]/install for latest installation instructions
#------------------------------------------------------------------
FEATURE SERIAL LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent uncounted \
VENDOR_STRING=C,18000100200 HOSTID=ANY sort=100 SN=1234567 \
TS_OK SIGN=8045890A6FE4
FEATURE COMSOL LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent uncounted HOSTID="70f2b13f4dfd \
0116b8cc761a" PLATFORMS="i86_n x64_n i86_mac x64_mac" \
SN=2076312 SIGN=E607EB680852
FEATURE PARTICLETRACING LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent uncounted \
HOSTID="70f1a12f4dfc 0026b9cc760a" PLATFORMS="i86_n x64_n \
i86_mac x64_mac" SN=2076312 SIGN=3835733C6290
FEATURE SUBSURFACEFLOW LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent uncounted \
HOSTID="70f1a12f4dfc 0026b9cc760a" PLATFORMS="i86_n x64_n \
i86_mac x64_mac" SN=2076312 SIGN=3A9BA162C9E4
FEATURE LLEXCEL LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent uncounted HOSTID="70f1a12f4dfc \
0026b9cc760a" PLATFORMS="i86_n x64_n i86_mac x64_mac" \
SN=2076312 SIGN=EE9C11E44356
FEATURE COMSOLGUI LMCOMSOL 6.4 permanent uncounted \
HOSTID="70f1a12f4dfc 0026b9cc760a" PLATFORMS="i86_n x64_n \
i86_mac x64_mac" SN=2076312 SIGN=0D0A83382550

A Single User License file can normally not be edited or changed in any way by
the user but has to be identical to the one sent to you by a COMSOL
representative. However, if you were sent a license file that requires a license
manager, then minor edits are required. For information on the type of license file
required for installations using a license manager, see The License File.
Registering with COMSOL Access
Once you have saved your license file, follow these steps to register or login to
COMSOL Access and to start the installation:
1 Click the link for downloading the software as given in the software download
email from your COMSOL representative. This link is identical or similar to:
[Link]/product-download.

80 |
2 If you have not already created a COMSOL Access account, you are prompted
to create it. While creating the account, point to your license file ([Link])
to associate it with your account information.
If you already created a COMSOL Access account, then you can associate the
license file on the COMSOL Access page with your account under Manage
Licenses at [Link]/access/licenses.
3 Continue with the instructions in the next section.

D o w n lo a d i n g a n d I n s t a l l i n g t h e C O M S O L So f t w a r e

1 Go to the web page [Link]/product-download. To download the

COMSOL installer, you must first create a COMSOL Access account as
described in the section Installation over the Internet.
2 You are now given the option of downloading the COMSOL online installer or
the COMSOL offline installer. For both options, make sure to download the
version that matches your computer’s CPU architecture:
- COMSOL64_macarm64.dmg or COMSOL64_maci64.dmg (online).
- COMSOL64_full_macarm64.dmg or COMSOL64_full_maci64.dmg (offline).

If you have problems downloading (such as Error downloading file.

Connection refused: connect), please review this knowledge base
entry: [Link]/support/knowledgebase/1149. If you
still have problems, contact your local COMSOL representative or
technical support from the Support Center page
[Link]/support.

S TARTING THE I NSTALLER

The COMSOL Installer is a user interface tool that guides you through the
installation process. To run the installer:
1 Mount the DMG-file by double-clicking it and open it in Finder.
2 Launch the COMSOL Installer by double-clicking COMSOL Setup.
3 The COMSOL 6.4 Installer window should now appear. Continue with the
instructions in the section Running The COMSOL Installer below.

| 81
Installation from USB Flash Drive

If you have received a USB Flash Drive from a COMSOL representative:

1 Connect the USB Flash Drive to your computer and open it in Finder.
2 Launch the COMSOL Installer by double-clicking COMSOL Setup.
3 The COMSOL 6.4 Installer window should now appear. Continue with the
instructions in the section Running The COMSOL Installer below.

Running The COMSOL Installer

The steps for running the COMSOL Installer are independent of the installation
media. If you have followed the above instructions, the COMSOL Installer should
now appear. Continue with the instructions for Windows in the section Running
the COMSOL Installer.

A u t o m a t e d I n s ta l l a t i o n

You can install the COMSOL software using an automated installation process
with minimal user interaction. This method requires installation from the offline
installer and an answer file.
The answer file is a text file with a specific format that contains predefined settings
for the COMSOL installer. If non-ASCII characters are used, the answer file is
expected to be UTF-8 encoded by default, but UTF-16 is also supported if the
file starts with a byte order mark (BOM).
A template answer file, [Link], with detailed usage information is
available in the DMG image.
To perform an automated installation:
1 Open the DMG file in Finder.
2 Copy [Link] to a local directory and customize it as needed.
3 Right-click COMSOL 6.4 Installer and select Show Package Contents.
4 Navigate to Contents > Resources and locate the setup executable.
5 Open a Terminal window.

82 |
6 Click and drag the setup executable to the terminal window. The full path
should be copied to the command prompt.
7 In the terminal, add -s and the full path of your [Link] file to the
command, with spaces in between. If needed, it should be possible to click and
drag the [Link] file to the terminal to input the path.
8 Run the command, which should now resemble something like this:
/Volumes/COMSOL64_full_macarm64/COMSOL\ 6.4\ [Link]/Contents/
Resources/setup -s /Users/username/Desktop/[Link]

or this:
/Volumes/COMSOL64_full_maci64/COMSOL\ 6.4\ [Link]/Contents/
Resources/setup -s /Users/username/Desktop/[Link]

depending on the CPU architecture.

Removing (Uninstalling) the COMSOL Installation

To remove a COMSOL installation from your system, you can use the COMSOL
Installer’s uninstallation option. This removes all the files and directories that were
initially created by the COMSOL Installer. Files and directories that were created
or modified after the installation are not removed.
You can start the COMSOL Uninstaller in a few different ways:
• Launch the COMSOL Setup application from the installation directory, and
select Uninstall COMSOL 6.4.
• Launch the COMSOL Installer using the same method as for the original
installation, and select Uninstall COMSOL 6.4.
• In a terminal window, run the following command:
/Applications/COMSOL64/Multiphysics/setup uninstall

Alternatively, to remove the COMSOL installation, you can also delete the
COMSOL64 folder including all subfolders. The following file may also be added by
the installer: /Library/LaunchDaemons/[Link].

| 83
Product Updates and Application Library Update

COMSOL periodically releases product updates with improvements and

corrections to reported problems. By default, COMSOL does not check for
updates at startup. You can turn this feature on and off from the Preferences
window accessible from the COMSOL Desktop. Here you can also configure
settings for the Application Library Update.
The COMSOL Application Library is updated on a regular basis by COMSOL.
To open the Application Library Update window from the File > Help menu
(Windows users) or from the Help menu (macOS and Linux users), select Update
COMSOL Application Libraries.
This connects you to the COMSOL Application Update website where you can
access the latest updates. This includes files that have been added or improved
since the latest product release.
Using the Updates section in the Preferences window, which you open from the
COMSOL Desktop, you can configure proxy server settings as well as application
and documentation directories for the Application Library Update. See the
COMSOL Multiphysics Reference Manual for more information including
command-line options for the Application Libraries.
As an alternative, you can update COMSOL without starting the update from
inside COMSOL Multiphysics. To do this, run COMSOL [Link].

A UTOMATED U PDATES
You can update the COMSOL software using an automated update process with
minimal user interaction using the abovementioned DAT-file. Consult
[Link]/product-update for detailed instructions.

Changing the Path to the MATLAB® Installation

You can change the path to the MATLAB installation in the Preferences > LiveLink
Connections window accessed from the Options menu of the COMSOL Desktop.
For more information, see the LiveLink™ for MATLAB® documentation.

84 |
Cluster Installation

COMSOL Multiphysics supports two modes of parallel operation:

shared-memory parallel operations and distributed-memory parallel operations,
including cluster support. This section is dedicated to distributed-memory parallel
installation.
COMSOL Multiphysics can distribute computations on compute clusters using
the MPI model. One large simulation can be distributed across many compute
nodes. Also, parametric sweeps can be done with individual parameter cases
distributed to each cluster node.

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS
The installation instructions above can also be followed for clusters. COMSOL
supports shared-memory parallelism and distributed-memory parallelism on
macOS with Apple silicon. For details on system requirements, including
additional software packages required for certain configurations, see
[Link]/system-requirements.

LICENSE MANAGER
COMSOL Multiphysics requires a Floating Network License for running on
clusters. Please check the license file for the CLUSTERNODE feature, which needs to
be present to enable the cluster computing functionality. The license manager
needs to be accessible from all nodes in the cluster. Therefore it is often a good
idea to have it run on the head node.

INSTALLATION FOLDER
The COMSOL installation folder should be shared between all compute nodes
and the head node.

FEATURES
During installation, make sure the Cluster Components feature is selected.

ACCESS TO CLUSTER
If you work on a computer that is not on the cluster, install COMSOL
Multiphysics on that computer. Typically, you use a scheduler to launch jobs on
the cluster. Make sure the scheduler client software is installed on that computer.
You can configure the installation to use the scheduler by changing the
[Link] file according to the section on MPI Options in the COMSOL
Multiphysics Reference Manual.

| 85
For more information on installing and running COMSOL on clusters, see
Running COMSOL on Clusters and the COMSOL Multiphysics Reference
Manual.

86 |
License Manager Installation on macOS

Many of the instructions for installing the license manager are similar to those for
Windows. This section covers only the differences when installing on macOS. For
general information on the license manager software, see License Manager
Installation on Windows.

FlexNet® License Manager Software Components

The license manager consists of the following software components:

• License server manager (lmgrd)
• Vendor daemon (LMCOMSOL)
• FlexNet utility programs (lmutil and others)
The license server manager (lmgrd) and the vendor daemon (LMCOMSOL) run on the
license server. When a user starts COMSOL Multiphysics on a client computer,
communication is established through the network from the client to the license
server and the license server manager (lmgrd). The license server manager then
makes a request to the vendor daemon (LMCOMSOL), which releases licenses
according to information in the [Link] file. The FlexNet utility programs are
used for handling license server management tasks.

FlexNet® License Manager Documentation

For detailed information on the FlexNet® license manager software, select Help >
Documentation in the COMSOL Desktop and scroll to the bottom of the page to
locate a PDF copy of the FlexNet Publisher License Administration Guide.
Note: This PDF file is only available if you have locally installed documentation.

| 87
T h e Li c e n s e F i l e

The license file for use on macOS is identical to that for Windows. See The License
File and The License Features for more information.

Installing the License Manager

The license manager components are automatically installed when installing the
COMSOL software unless otherwise specified on the Products page of the
COMSOL Installer; see Products Page. The checkbox for the license manager
components can be found last in the list of software components.
If you want to install COMSOL on the same computer as the license manager,
perform a complete COMSOL installation and make sure to include the license
manager components.

LICENSE MANAGER PAGE

See License Manager Page for information about the license manager settings in
the installer. For macOS, this page also contains some additional settings:
• In the User to run license manager field, enter the username for the user that
will run the license manager. If left empty, the root user will run the license
manager, which is not recommended from a security point of view.
• Optionally, specify a group the user belongs to in the Group of the user field.
Note: The License Manager page only appears if the installer is started by a
superuser (such as root or by using sudo).
To run the installer with sudo:
1 Open the DMG-file in Finder.
2 Right-click COMSOL 6.4 Installer and select Show Package Contents.
3 Navigate to Contents > Resources and locate the setup executable.
4 Open a Terminal window.
5 Click and drag the setup executable to the terminal window. The full path
should be copied to the command prompt.
6 In the terminal, add sudo to the start of the command.
7 Run the command, which should resemble something like this:

88 |
 sudo /Volumes/COMSOL64_macarm64/COMSOL\ 6.4\ [Link]/Contents/
Resources/setup

or
sudo /Volumes/COMSOL64_maci64/COMSOL\ 6.4\ [Link]/Contents/
Resources/setup

depending on the CPU architecture.

When finished, skip the remainder of this section and continue with Starting the
License Manager.
To install only the license manager, follow the installation instructions for
COMSOL earlier in this document, and, on the Products page, clear all
checkboxes except the one for the license manager.

AUTOMATED LICENSE MANAGER INSTALLATION

Alternatively, the license manager can be installed using an automated installation
process with minimal user interaction; for this option, see Automated Installation.
Set licmanager = 1 in the answer file to install the license manager. It is also
possible to automatically configure the license manager to run as a service. Use
[Link] = 1 in the [Link] file and provide values for the
other [Link].* lines.

| 89
S ta r t i n g t h e L i c e n s e M a n a g e r

Either start the license manager manually or let it run automatically at startup.

STARTING THE LICENSE MANAGER MANUALLY

To start the license manager manually:
1 Change directory to the license/macarm64 or license/maci64 directory:
cd /Applications/COMSOL64/Multiphysics/license/macarm64

or
cd /Applications/COMSOL64/Multiphysics/license/maci64

depending on your CPU architecture.

2 Start the license manager:
./lmgrd -c ../[Link] -l /var/tmp/[Link]

The server is now ready to distribute licenses over the network. It writes any debug
information to the log file /var/tmp/[Link].

STARTING THE LICENSE MANAGER AUTOMATICALLY AT STARTUP

To configure the license manager to run automatically at startup:
1 Copy the template file [Link] to /Library/
LaunchDaemons:
sudo cp /Applications/COMSOL64/Multiphysics/license/macarm64/
[Link] /Library/LaunchDaemons/

or
sudo cp /Applications/COMSOL64/Multiphysics/license/maci64/
[Link] /Library/LaunchDaemons/

depending on your CPU architecture.

Typically, the template file must be edited: the lmgrd and [Link] paths
should be updated, and a user that is not root should be specified for running
the service.
2 Open the file /Library/LaunchDaemons/[Link] in a text
editor, for example, TextEdit, and make the necessary edits.
3 Set the correct permissions for the file:
sudo chmod 600 /Library/LaunchDaemons/[Link]

4 Enable and start the daemon:

sudo launchctl load -w /Library/LaunchDaemons/[Link]

90 |
To disable automatic startup for the license manager and remove the license
manager daemon:
1 Stop and disable the daemon:
sudo launchctl unload -w /Library/LaunchDaemons/[Link]

2 Remove the service file:

sudo rm -rf /Library/LaunchDaemons/[Link]

3 Remove the log file:

rm /var/tmp/[Link]

Verifying That the Lice n s e M a n a g e r I s R u n n i n g

Once you start the license manager, it is good practice to verify that the license
manager processes are running. Open the Activity Monitor and look for the
vendor daemon (LMCOMSOL) and license server manager (lmgrd) processes.

Starting COMSOL Multiphysics

After the installation is complete and the license manager is running on the license
server, you can start using COMSOL Multiphysics. For more information on how
to run COMSOL Multiphysics, see Running COMSOL Multiphysics on macOS.

Changing the License

If you have received a new license file — for example, when adding COMSOL
products to an existing license — replace the current license file with the new one

| 91
and then restart the license manager or reread the license file. Double-check the
contents of the new file to make sure it lists all the products included in the license.

When the license file has changed, you must restart the license
manager or reread the license file; otherwise, it continues to use
the old license file still in memory.

RESTARTING THE LICENSE MANAGER

To restart the license manager:
1 Change the directory to license/macarm64 or license/maci64:
cd /Applications/COMSOL64/Multiphysics/license/macarm64

or
cd /Applications/COMSOL64/Multiphysics/license/maci64

depending on your CPU architecture.

2 Stop the license manager:
./lmdown -c ../[Link]

3 Restart the license manager:

./lmgrd -c ../[Link] -l /var/tmp/[Link]

OBTAINING A HOSTID
If you need to verify the hostid of the license server, you can follow the steps in
Obtaining the Hostid. Alternatively, if COMSOL is already installed on the license
server, you can determine the hostid by running the lmhostid command:
COMSOL64/Multiphysics/license/macarm64/lmhostid

or
COMSOL64/Multiphysics/license/maci64/lmhostid

depending on your CPU architecture.

The hostid is typically the Ethernet address (also called a MAC address) of the
network card of your computer. An Ethernet address has six bytes, each with two
hexadecimal digits. Thus, the full hostid has twelve hexadecimal digits.

92 |
Using COMSOL on an IPv6 Network

COMSOL has been tested on both IPv6-only networks and hybrid IPv4/IPv6
networks. To make sure that the license manager uses IPv6 for communication,
set the environment variable FNP_IP_PRIORITY to 6. See the FlexNet Publisher
License Administration Guide for details.

Tr o uble s ho o t ing Lic en se Er r o r s

If you have questions or problems with your installation, see Troubleshooting

License Errors.

| 93
Running COMSOL Multiphysics on macOS

The COMSOL Applications

After the installation is finished there are several COMSOL applications available.
How many are available depends on which products and licenses you have:

COMSOL Multiphysics This is the primary application for running COMSOL

Multiphysics. It launches COMSOL Multiphysics as a standalone application.

COMSOL Multiphysics (Classkit License) This application launches COMSOL

Multiphysics for a Classkit License. This application is only available if you have a
Classkit License.

COMSOL Documentation This application starts the COMSOL Documentation

window, from which you can access and search all the installed documentation.

COMSOL with MATLAB Use this application for running COMSOL with
LiveLink™ for MATLAB®. This application is only available if you have a
LiveLink™ for MATLAB® license.

COMSOL with Simulink Use this application for running COMSOL with
LiveLink™ for Simulink®. This application is only available if you have a LiveLink™
for Simulink® license.

This application launches the Terminal application

COMSOL Multiphysics Server
and starts a COMSOL Multiphysics server in a terminal window.

COMSOL Update This application checks for available product updates on

[Link]

This application makes it possible to add, remove, and repair

COMSOL Setup
COMSOL products and to change the license.

The COMSOL applications do not work if moved outside the

COMSOL folder. Create an alias if, for example, a desktop icon is
required.

94 |
Running COMSOL Multiphysics from a Terminal Window

COMSOL Multiphysics can also be launched from a terminal window using the
shell script COMSOL64/Multiphysics/bin/comsol.
To run the comsol command more easily, include the COMSOL64/bin directory in
the path or make a symbolic link from /usr/bin/comsol to the comsol script.
Those with administrator privileges can create a symbolic link with the command
sudo ln -s /Applications/COMSOL64/Multiphysics/bin/comsol /usr/bin/comsol

(assuming COMSOL Multiphysics is installed in the default Applications folder).

This command asks for a password before creating the link.

The comsol command must not be moved from the COMSOL64/

Multiphysics/bin folder. The COMSOL applications also use this
script.

Running a Classkit License

To start COMSOL Multiphysics with a Classkit License, use the -ckl

command-line option. For example:
/Applications/COMSOL64/Multiphysics/bin/comsol -ckl

Running COMSOL on Clusters

You can launch COMSOL Multiphysics cluster jobs from the COMSOL Desktop
and the command line.
To run COMSOL Multiphysics on a cluster from the COMSOL Desktop, you
need to make the cluster feature visible: in the Model Builder tree, click the Show
More Options button ( ) and select Batch and Cluster in the Show More Options
dialog. Then in the Model Builder, right-click a Study node and select Cluster
Computing or Cluster Sweep to create cluster jobs. Cluster computing requires a
Floating Network License.

| 95
The following terms occur frequently when describing the hardware for cluster
computing and shared memory parallel computing:
• Compute node: The compute nodes are where the distributed computing
occurs. Each distributed COMSOL process resides in a compute node and
communicates with other compute nodes using MPI (message-passing
interface).
• Host: The host is a physical machine (hardware) with a network adapter and
unique network address. The host is part of the cluster. It is sometimes
referred to as a physical node.
• Core: The core is a processor core used in shared-memory parallelism by a
computational node with multiple processors.
The number of used hosts and the number of computational nodes are usually the
same. For some special simulation types, like very small simulations with many
parameters, it might be beneficial to use more than one computational node on
one host.
A tutorial model for cluster testing is included in the Application Libraries window
under COMSOL Multiphysics/Cluster_and_Batch_Tutorials/micromixer_cluster.

QUICK TROUBLESHOOTING
• First, ensure that you have the latest release installed. Check that you have
COMSOL 6.4 or later and make sure to install the latest product updates.
• If you get the error message Process status indicates that process is running,
then cancel any running jobs in the scheduler that you use. In the COMSOL
Desktop, locate the External Process page at the lower-right. Click the Clear
Status button.

For more information about how to run COMSOL Multiphysics in parallel on

Mac clusters, see the COMSOL Multiphysics Reference Manual. For installation
on Clusters, see Cluster Installation.

R u n n i n g C O M S O L M u l t i p h ys i c s i n C l i e n t – S e r v e r M o d e

When you start COMSOL Multiphysics by, for example, launching the COMSOL
Multiphysics application, COMSOL Multiphysics is run as a single application that
includes the functionality of both the COMSOL Multiphysics Client and
COMSOL Multiphysics server, as explained later in this section. However, the
COMSOL client–server architecture lets you access the COMSOL Multiphysics

96 |
server — the COMSOL computational engine — as a separate process. For
example, the COMSOL Desktop can act as a COMSOL Multiphysics Client when
connected to a COMSOL Multiphysics server.

The license server is not the same as a COMSOL Multiphysics

server. The license manager can run on a computer different from
both the ones used by COMSOL Desktop and COMSOL
Multiphysics server.

You need a Floating Network License to run the COMSOL Multiphysics server
and the COMSOL Multiphysics Client on separate computers. However, any
COMSOL license is sufficient for running the Client and the server on the same
computer.
The Client and server need not run on the same platform. For example, you can
run the COMSOL Desktop on macOS and connect to a COMSOL Multiphysics
server on a Windows or Linux computer. This enables offloading heavy-duty
computations from your personal laptop or desktop to run just the COMSOL
Desktop graphical user interface. A typical use would be to run the COMSOL
Multiphysics server on a computer with large amounts of memory (RAM) and
processing power and to use your personal computer for pre- and postprocessing
with the COMSOL Desktop.

STARTING A COMSOL M ULTIPHYSICS S ERVER

To start the COMSOL Multiphysics server, run the COMSOL Multiphysics
Server application. A terminal window appears asking you for a username and
password. You can choose any username and password, it is only used for
connecting a COMSOL Multiphysics client with a COMSOL Multiphysics server.
When the COMSOL Multiphysics server starts, it listens for a COMSOL
Multiphysics client connection on the port listed in the command window.
Connecting a COMSOL Multiphysics Client to a COMSOL Multiphysics Server
You can start a COMSOL Multiphysics client session from the COMSOL
Desktop by selecting Connect to Server from the File menu in the COMSOL
Desktop. When you start the client, a Connect to COMSOL Multiphysics Server
window appears prompting you for a computer name (Server) where the

| 97
COMSOL Multiphysics server is running, Port number, Username, and
Password.

Once you have filled out this information and clicked OK, the COMSOL
Multiphysics server terminal window displays information that a COMSOL
Multiphysics client has connected. For more information on running COMSOL
in client–server mode, see the COMSOL Multiphysics Reference Manual.

R u n n i n g C O M S O L M u l t i p h ys i c s i n B a t c h M o d e

You can submit COMSOL Multiphysics batch jobs from the COMSOL Desktop
and the command line.
To run a COMSOL Multiphysics batch job from the COMSOL Desktop, you
need to make the Batch feature visible: in the Model Builder tree, click the Show
More Options button ( ) and select Batch and Cluster in the Show More Options
dialog. In the Model Builder, right-click a Study node and select Batch to create
batch jobs.
From the terminal window, you can start batch jobs using the comsol batch
command. This is an example of how such a command could look:
comsol batch -inputfile [Link] -outputfile [Link]

To run a specific study add the command line option -study <tag>, where <tag>
is the tag of the study to run, for instance, std1. To see the tag, click the toolbar
button Model Tree Node Text in the Model Builder and select Tag.
The COMSOL Multiphysics Reference Manual includes a dedicated section on
running COMSOL Multiphysics from the terminal window, including a list of
COMSOL commands and associated syntax.

98 |
Multicore Settings

COMSOL Multiphysics supports two modes of parallel operation:

shared-memory parallel operations and distributed-memory parallel operations,
including cluster support for Windows and Linux. This section covers
shared-memory processing, or multithreading, which is important for the
performance of COMSOL Multiphysics computations. Some terms that are
frequently used in when describing multithreading are:
• Core: The core is a processor core used in shared-memory parallelism by a
computational node with multiple processors.
• Speedup is how many times faster a job runs on N cores compared to 1 core,
on a specific compute node. The speedup depends on the simulation type,
the hardware used, and hardware drivers used.
On macOS, the default number of processor cores used by COMSOL
Multiphysics is the total number of available physical cores. For example, if you
have a 2 x dual core machine, 4 cores are used in parallel by a COMSOL process.

SHARED - MEMORY OPTIONS

From the terminal window, use the comsol command option -np to control the
number of cores and processors used. The default is to use all available cores and
processors. For example:
comsol -np 2

launches COMSOL using 2 cores (if available).

You can experiment to find the options that work best for your configuration. For
more information see the COMSOL Multiphysics Reference Manual.

R u n n i n g C O M S O L M u l t i p h ys i c s o n C l u s t e r s

You can launch COMSOL Multiphysics cluster jobs from the COMSOL Desktop
and the command line. To run COMSOL Multiphysics on a cluster, you need to
make the cluster feature visible: in the Model Builder tree, click the Show More
Options button ( ) and select Batch and Cluster in the Show More Options dialog.
Then in the Model Builder, right-click a Study node and select Cluster Computing

| 99
or Cluster Sweep to create cluster jobs. Cluster computing requires a Floating
Network License.

COMSOL Multiphysics cannot be run on a cluster running

macOS Intel; however, you can use the Cluster Computing or
Cluster Sweep feature to connect to a Windows, Linux, or macOS
ARM64 cluster.

A tutorial model for cluster testing is included in the Application Libraries window
under COMSOL Multiphysics/Cluster_and_Batch_Tutorials/micromixer_cluster.
For more information about how to run COMSOL Multiphysics in parallel on
clusters, see the COMSOL Multiphysics Reference Manual. For installation on
Clusters, see Cluster Installation for Windows and Cluster Installation for Linux.

R u n n i n g C O M S O L M u l t i p h ys i c s o n t h e C l o u d

COMSOL Multiphysics and COMSOL Server support cloud computing. See

• [Link]/partners-consultants/hpc
• [Link]/model/
running-the-comsol-software-with-amazon-ec2-14075
• [Link]/model/
running-the-comsol-software-with-microsoft-azure-89751

100 |
Installing on Linux

I n s ta l l at i o n O v e r th e I n te r n e t

INSTALLATION OF A TRIAL LICENSE OVER THE I NTERNET

A trial license can be given to you with the intention to test the software without
any payment obligation for noncommercial and nonproduction use. This option
is not available in all regions.
Installation of a Single User Trial License requires a license passcode. A passcode
has a form similar to FFFFFFFF-TYUS-123456-1234567-123456789.
This is usually sent to you by your COMSOL representative by email. Once you
locate your passcode, follow these steps to prepare for download and installation:
1 Click the link for downloading the software as given in the software download
email from your COMSOL representative. This link is identical or similar to:
[Link]/product-download.
2 If you have not already created a COMSOL Access account, you are prompted
to create it. When you have created the account, you can enter your license
passcode to associate it with your account information.
If you already created a COMSOL Access account, you can associate the license
file with your account on the COMSOL Access page under Manage Licenses at
[Link]/access/licenses.
3 Follow the web-based instructions to download the software.

A license passcode can also be used for class kit licenses (CKL).
Continue with the instructions in the section Downloading and Installing the
COMSOL Software.

INSTALLATION OF A PAID - FOR OR T RIAL LICENSE OVER THE I NTERNET

Installation of any paid-for license on Linux requires a license file, which is sent to
you by your COMSOL representative by email. To be able to generate the license
file, information about your hardware is needed in the form of a hostid (host ID).

| 101
The hostid is used to lock the license to your hardware and needs to be sent by
you to a COMSOL representative prior to the license file being generated.

A trial license can be given to you with the intention to test the
software without any payment obligation for noncommercial or
nonproduction use. This option is not available in all regions. For
installation of a Single User Trial License on Linux, you can follow
the same instructions as for a paid-for license.

Obtaining the Hostid

Follow these steps to obtain a hostid:
1 Start a Terminal window.
2 Enter cat /sys/class/net/*/address
This displays all physical Ethernet addresses (also called MAC addresses) which
consists of six bytes displayed as six pairs of hexadecimal digits such as
00:40:05:16:E5:25. Choose one that does not consist of zeros only.

Obtaining the Hostname

If you have been informed by a COMSOL representative that you need to run a
license manager for your installation, then you also need the hostname:
1 To get the hostname, start a Terminal window.
2 Enter hostname at the terminal prompt.
If your network administrator prefers to use a fixed IP address for this particular
computer, this IP Address can be optionally used in place of the hostname. For
more information on license manager installation see License Manager Installation
on Linux.
Obtaining the License File from a COMSOL Representative
Send the hostid information, as well as hostname, if applicable, in an email to your
COMSOL representative, who responds by email including an attached license file
([Link]). Save this file to any location on your computer. You need to refer
to it during installation. A trial license file for Linux cannot normally be edited or
changed in any way by the user but has to be identical to the one sent to you by a
COMSOL representative. However, if you were sent a license file that requires a
license manager, then minor edits are required. For information on the type of
license file required for installations using a license manager, see The License File.
Registering with COMSOL Access
Once you have saved your license file, follow these steps to register or login to
COMSOL Access and to start the installation:

102 |
1 Click the link for downloading the software as given in the software download
email from your COMSOL representative. This link is identical or similar to:
[Link]/product-download.
2 If you have not already created a COMSOL Access account, you are prompted
to create it. While creating the account, point to your license file ([Link])
to associate it with your account information.
If you already created a COMSOL Access account, then you can associate the
license file on the COMSOL Access page with your account under Manage
Licenses at [Link]/access/licenses.
3 Continue with the instructions in the section below.

D o w n lo a d i n g a n d I n s t a l l i n g t h e C O M S O L So f t w a r e

1 Go to the web page [Link]/product-download. To download the

COMSOL installer, you must first create a COMSOL Access account as
described in the section Installation over the Internet.
2 You are now given the options of downloading the COMSOL online installer
or the COMSOL offline installer (a DVD image).

If you have problems downloading (such as Error downloading file.

Connection refused: connect), please review this knowledge base
entry: [Link]/support/knowledgebase/1149. If you
still have problems, contact your local COMSOL representative or
technical support from the Support Center page
[Link]/support.

S TARTING THE O NLINE I NSTALLER FOR I NSTALLATION OVER THE I NTERNET

The COMSOL Installer is a user interface tool that guides you through the
installation process. The file to download is called comsol64_lnx.zip. Start the
COMSOL Installer by extracting the downloaded file and then running the setup
script. The COMSOL 6.4 Installer window should now appear. Next, continue
with the instructions in the section Running The COMSOL Installer. below.

| 103
I NSTALLATION FROM D OWNLOADED DVD I MAGE
1 Download the DVD image(s). The default image, COMSOL64_dvd.iso, is too
large to burn to disc and must be mounted directly. For installations that require
physical discs, download the files COMSOL64_dvd_1.iso, COMSOL64_dvd_2.iso,
and COMSOL64_dvd_3.iso instead.
2 When you have downloaded the DVD image(s), mount the single image
directly or burn the numbered images to discs. To directly mount the image,
you can use a loopback device:
mount -o loop,exec COMSOL64_dvd.iso /mnt

STARTING THE INSTALLER FROM A DVD OR MOUNTED DVD IMAGE

The COMSOL Installer is a user interface tool that guides you through the
installation process. To start the installer:
1 Make sure the COMSOL DVD is in the DVD drive (or mount the image).
2 Type /mnt/setup
The COMSOL 6.4 Installer window appears. Now continue with the instructions
in the section Running The COMSOL Installer below.

Installing from a DVD

This section applies if you have received a DVD from a COMSOL representative.
The COMSOL Installer is a user interface tool that guides you through the
installation process. To start the installer:
1 Insert the COMSOL 6.4 DVD into the DVD drive.
2 If the DVD is not mounted automatically by your operating system, use the
mount command to mount it.
3 To start the installation, enter the command:
<drivepath>/setup
where <drivepath> is the mount point of the DVD drive, for example
/media/cdrom

You might have to mount the DVD with the option -o exec if your Linux
distribution mounts the DVD without execute options by default.
The COMSOL 6.4 Installer window appears. Now continue with the instructions
in the section Running The COMSOL Installer below.

104 |
Installation from USB Flash Drive

If you have received a USB Flash Drive from a COMSOL representative:

1 Connect the USB Flash Drive to your computer.
2 If the USB Flash Drive is not mounted automatically by your operating system,
use the mount command to mount it.
3 To start the installation, enter the command:
<drivepath>/setup
where <drivepath> is the mount point of the USB Flash Drive, for example
/media/usb

You might have to mount the USB Flash Drive with the option -o exec if your
Linux distribution mounts the drive without execute options by default.
4 The COMSOL 6.4 Installer window appears. Now continue with the
instructions in the section Running The COMSOL Installer below.

Running The COMSOL Installer

The steps for running the COMSOL Installer are independent of the installation
media option you use. If you have followed the above instructions, the COMSOL
Installer should now appear. For a detailed description and screenshots of the
different COMSOL Installer steps, see the instructions for Windows in the section
Running the COMSOL Installer. The procedure for running the COMSOL
Installer on Linux is similar and summarized below with the differences from
installation on Windows highlighted:
1 When the installer window appears, click New Installation.
2 Read the license agreement, select I accept the terms of the license agreement,
specify License information, and then click Next.
3 If you have a Named Single User License and you are installing the software on
the license server, a dialog opens up and you are asked to enter the username to
bind the license to.
4 Select the products to install and specify the path to the COMSOL installation
directory. Installing in the default path requires administrative rights.
5 Click Next.
6 If you have licensed LiveLink™ for MATLAB® or LiveLink™ for Simulink®, then
specify the MATLAB root folder.

| 105
7 Click Next.
8 Click Install to start the installation.
9 When the installation process is finished, the Finish window appears. If errors
arose during installation, this window issues a notification. The installer also
writes a log entry into the text file [Link], which resides in the
specified installation directory. Click Close to quit the installer. If you installed
from DVD, use the unmount and eject commands to unmount and eject the
DVD. Some Linux configurations automatically unmount and eject the DVD
when you press the DVD drive button.
10 To make sure all users can easily start COMSOL Multiphysics, include the
comsol64/bin directory in all users’ paths or make a symbolic link from /usr/
local/bin/comsol to the comsol command (see the Linux ln command). The
installer can do this step automatically if you run the installer as an
administrator.

You may also need to install the fonts (using the normal Linux
distribution methods) for the languages that you want to use
when running COMSOL Multiphysics.

Web Browser for Viewing Documentation and Help

By default, documentation is shown in the Documentation window and context

help in the Help window integrated in the COMSOL Desktop. If you prefer to use
an external browser, you can specify this on the Help page of the Preferences
window.
You can choose your preferred web browser in two ways:
• In the Executable field on the User Interface page of the Preferences window.
• If no browser executable has been specified, the browser to use is
determined by the script browser in the bin directory. The variable BROWSERS
in this file contains a list of web browsers that are available with the
supported Linux versions in order of preference. Edit the file in any text
editor to adjust it for your preferred web browser. To make a specific
browser the preferred web browser, put it first in the list.

106 |
A u t o m a t e d I n s ta l l a t i o n

You can install the COMSOL software using an automated installation process
with minimal user interaction. This method requires installation from a DVD or
DVD image and an answer file.
The answer file is a text file with a specific format that contains predefined settings
for the COMSOL installer. If non-ASCII characters are used, the answer file is
expected to be UTF-8 encoded by default, but UTF-16 is also supported if the
file starts with a byte order mark (BOM).
A template answer file, [Link], with detailed usage information is
available on the DVD. Create a copy of this file and customize it with a text editor.
When the answer file is ready, start the installation by running
<drivepath>/setup -s <answerfile>
where <drivepath> is the media mount point, and where <answerfile> is the
complete path to your answer file.

Removing (Uninstalling) the COMSOL Installation

To remove a COMSOL installation from your system, you can use the COMSOL
Installer’s uninstallation option. This removes all the files and directories that were
initially created by the COMSOL Installer. Files and directories that were created
or modified after the installation are not removed.
You can start the COMSOL Uninstaller in a few different ways:
• Launch the COMSOL Installer using the same method as for the original
installation, and select Uninstall COMSOL 6.4.
• In a terminal window, run the following command:
/usr/local/comsol64/multiphysics/setup uninstall

Alternatively, to remove the COMSOL installation, delete the comsol64 folder

including all subfolders and the following files if they exist:
/usr/local/bin/comsol
/usr/local/bin/comsol-6.4
/usr/share/applications/[Link]
~/.local/share/applications/[Link]
/usr/lib/systemd/system/[Link]

| 107
Product Updates and Application Library Update

COMSOL periodically releases product updates with improvements and

corrections to reported problems. By default, COMSOL does not check for
updates at startup. You can turn this feature on and off from the Preferences
window accessible from the COMSOL Desktop. Here you can also configure
settings for the Application Library Update.
The COMSOL Application Library is updated on a regular basis by COMSOL.
To open the Application Library Update window, from the Help menu, select Update
COMSOL Application Libraries.
This connects you to the COMSOL Application Update website where you can
access the latest updates. This includes applications that have been added or
improved since the latest product release.
Using the Updates section in the Preferences window, which you open from the
COMSOL Desktop, you can configure proxy server settings as well as application
and documentation directories for the Application Library Update. See the
COMSOL Multiphysics Reference Manual for more information including
command-line options for the Application Libraries.

A UTOMATED U PDATES
You can update the COMSOL software using an automated update process with
minimal user interaction using the abovementioned DAT-file. Consult
[Link]/product-update for detailed instructions.

Changing the Path to the MATLAB® Installation

You can change the path to the MATLAB installation in the Preferences > LiveLink
Connections window accessed from the Options menu of the COMSOL Desktop.
For more information, see the LiveLink™ for MATLAB® documentation.

Cluster Installation

COMSOL Multiphysics supports two modes of parallel operation:

shared-memory parallel operations and distributed-memory parallel operations,

108 |
including cluster support. This section is dedicated to distributed-memory parallel
installation.
COMSOL Multiphysics can distribute computations on compute clusters using
the MPI model. One large simulation can be distributed across many compute
nodes. Also, parametric sweeps can be done with individual parameter cases
distributed to each cluster node.

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS
The installation instructions above can also be followed for clusters. COMSOL
supports shared-memory parallelism and distributed-memory parallelism on
Linux. For details on system requirements, including additional software packages
required for certain configurations, see [Link]/system-requirements.

LICENSE MANAGER
COMSOL Multiphysics requires a Floating Network License for running on
clusters. Please check the license file for the CLUSTERNODE feature, which needs to
be present to enable the cluster computing functionality. The license manager
needs to be accessible from all nodes in the cluster. Therefore it is often a good
idea to have it run on the head node.

INSTALLATION FOLDER
The COMSOL installation folder should be shared between all compute nodes
and the head node.

FEATURES
During installation, make sure the Cluster Components feature is selected.

ACCESS TO CLUSTER
If you work on a computer that is not on the cluster, install COMSOL
Multiphysics on that computer. Typically, you use a scheduler to launch jobs on
the cluster. Make sure the scheduler client software is installed on that computer.
You can configure the installation to use the scheduler by changing the
[Link] file according to the section on MPI Options in the COMSOL
Multiphysics Reference Manual.
For more information on installing and running COMSOL on clusters, see
Running COMSOL on Clusters and the COMSOL Multiphysics Reference
Manual.

| 109
License Manager Installation on Linux

Many of the instructions for installing the license manager are similar to those for
Windows. This section only covers the differences for Linux installations. For
more information, see License Manager Installation on Windows.

FlexNe t ® L i c e n s e M a n a g e r S o f t w a r e C o m p o n e n t s

The license manager consists of the following software components:

• License server manager (lmgrd)
• Vendor daemon (LMCOMSOL)
• FlexNet utility programs (lmutil and others)
The license server manager (lmgrd) and the vendor daemon (LMCOMSOL) run on the
license server. When a user starts COMSOL on a client computer, communication
is established through the network from the client to the license server and the
license server manager (lmgrd). The license server manager then makes a request
to the vendor daemon (LMCOMSOL), which releases licenses according to
information in the [Link] file. The FlexNet utility programs are used for
handling license server management tasks.

FlexNe t ® L i c e n s e M a n a g e r D o c u m e n t a t i o n

For detailed information on the FlexNet® license manager software, select Help >
Documentation in the COMSOL Desktop and scroll to the bottom of the page to
locate a PDF copy of the FlexNet Publisher License Administration Guide.
Note: This PDF file is only available if you have locally installed documentation.

110 |
T h e Li c e n s e F i l e

The license file for use on Linux is identical to that for Windows, except in the case
of a Named Single User License, which is described below. See The License File
and The License Features for general license file information.

LICENSE FILES FOR NAMED SINGLE USER LICENSE

If you have a named single user license, the installer automatically creates an
options file that binds the license to the named user. This section describes the
format of the options file and how the [Link] file points to the options file.
Below is an example of an options file, [Link], for a user “philip” who has
access to COMSOL Multiphysics, the Structural Mechanics Module, and the
CAD Import Module. Notice that to access COMSOL Multiphysics, the options
file must include both the COMSOL and the COMSOLGUI features:
INCLUDE COMSOL USER philip
INCLUDE COMSOLGUI USER philip
INCLUDE CADIMPORT USER philip
INCLUDE CADREADER USER philip
INCLUDE STRUCTURALMECHANICS USER philip

Each INCLUDE row in the [Link] file has a corresponding FEATURE row in the
[Link] file (with the USER_BASED keyword). The second item on each
FEATURE row is the name of the feature for which you have a license.
For more information on which FEATURE items are available, see The License File
and The License Features.
The [Link] file needs to point to the options file. The path to the options
file is indicated by the options keyword. If your options file is placed here:
/usr/local/comsol64/multiphysics/license/[Link]

then the VENDOR row in [Link] should read

VENDOR LMCOMSOL port=1719 options=/usr/local/comsol64/multiphysics/
license/[Link]

Installing the License Manager

The license manager components are automatically installed when installing the
COMSOL software unless otherwise specified on the Products page of the
COMSOL installer; see Products Page. The checkbox for the license manager
components can be found last in the list of software components.

| 111
If you want to install COMSOL on the same computer as the license manager and
you did not choose to install the license manager as a service, first perform a
complete COMSOL installation including the license manager software
components.

L ICENSE M ANAGER P AGE

See License Manager Page for information about the license manager settings in
the installer. For Linux, this page also contains some additional settings:
• In the User to run license manager field, enter the username for the user on
the computer that will run the license manager. If this field is empty, the root
user runs the license manager, which is not recommended from a security
point of view.
• Optionally, specify a group the user belongs to in the Group of the user field.
Note: The License Manager page only appears if the installer is started by a
superuser (such as root or by using sudo) on a system that uses systemd.

To install only the license manager, follow the installation instructions for
COMSOL earlier in this document, and on the Products page, clear all
checkboxes except the one for the license manager.
When finished, skip the remainder of this section and continue with Starting the
License Manager below.

112 |
AUTOMATED LICENSE MANAGER INSTALLATION
Alternatively, the license manager can be installed using an automated installation
process with minimal user interaction, see Automated Installation. Set
licmanager = 1 in the answer file to install the license manager. It is also possible
to automatically configure the license manager to run on systemd-based Linux
distributions. Use [Link] = 1 in the [Link] file and
provide values for the other [Link].* lines.

S ta r t i n g t h e L i c e n s e M a n a g e r

You can start the license manager manually or it can run automatically at boot.

The installer can set up the license manager to start automatically;

in case it did, you can skip the following section.

STARTING THE LICENSE MANAGER MANUALLY

To start the license manager manually, make the license/$arch directory the
current directory and enter
./lmgrd -c ../[Link] -l /var/tmp/[Link]

The server is now ready to distribute licenses over the network. It writes any debug
information to the log file /var/tmp/[Link].

STARTING THE LICENSE MANAGER AUTOMATICALLY AT BOOT

In order for the license manager to start automatically at boot, you need to add
shell commands to the appropriate boot script. You must be a superuser (root) to
edit boot scripts. In some cases, however, the COMSOL Installer automatically
installs and configures the license manager.

For security reasons, it is recommended that the daemons are not

started as root. Instead, use a dedicated username to start the
license manager.

| 113
systemd-Based Systems
For Linux distributions that use systemd, use the [Link] file, located
in the comsol64/license/glnxa64 or comsol64/license/glnxarm64 directory, to
start the license manager. To use [Link], do the following steps:
1 Update the paths to lmgrd, [Link], and [Link] in case you have
different locations for these files.
2 Optionally, replace username with an actual username. Preferably do not use
root; instead, use the account used to install COMSOL or another account with
access to both the lmgrd executable and the log file location above.
3 Create a /usr/tmp directory if it does not exist and set its permissions to 1777
with the chmod 1777 /usr/tmp command.
4 If you already have the license manager installed using systemd, stop the
previous version of it by typing systemctl stop lmcomsol.
5 Copy the [Link] file to /usr/lib/systemd/system/ and run the
systemctl enable lmcomsol and systemctl start lmcomsol commands to
activate the license manager.

If you obtained the license server binaries through COMSOL

support and run SELinux on your system, make sure to unzip the
binaries under /usr/local.

Verifying That the Lice n s e M a n a g e r I s R u n n i n g

Once you start the license manager, it is good practice to verify that the license
manager processes are running. Use administrative commands such as top or ps to
check that both the vendor daemon (LMCOMSOL) and the license server manager
(lmgrd) are running. On Linux distributions that use systemd, if the license
manager is installed as a service according to the instructions, you can run service
lmcomsol status instead.

114 |
Starting COMSOL Multiphysics

After the installation is complete and the license manager is running on the license
server, you can start using COMSOL Multiphysics. For more information on how
to run COMSOL Multiphysics, see Running COMSOL Multiphysics on Linux.

Changing the License

If you have received a new license file — for example, when adding COMSOL
products to an existing license — replace the current license file with the new one.
Double-check the contents of this file to make sure it lists the products that the
license includes.

When the license file has been changed, you must restart the
license manager or reread the license file; otherwise, it continues
to use the old license file still in memory.

RESTARTING THE LICENSE MANAGER

To restart the license manager, make the license/$arch directory under the
COMSOL installation directory the current directory, then enter the following
commands:
./lmdown -c ../[Link]
./lmgrd -c ../[Link] -l /var/tmp/[Link]

When installed as a service on Linux distributions with systemd according to the

instructions, you stop it with the service lmcomsol stop command and start it
with the service lmcomsol start command.

OBTAINING A HOSTID
If the COMSOL software is already installed on your license server, you can
determine the hostid by executing the lmhostid command:
comsol64/multiphysics/license/glnxa64/lmhostid

or
comsol64/multiphysics/license/glnxarm64/lmhostid

depending on your CPU architecture.

| 115
Using COMSOL on an IPv6 Network

COMSOL has been tested on both IPv6-only networks and hybrid IPv4/IPv6
networks. To make sure that the license manager uses IPv6 for communication,
set the environment variable FNP_IP_PRIORITY to 6. See the FlexNet License
Administration Guide for details.

T r o u b l e s h o o ti n g L i c e n s e E r r o r s

If you have questions or problems with your installation, see Troubleshooting

License Errors.

116 |
Running COMSOL Multiphysics on Linux

In order for the help system to work on Linux, some packages

need to be installed; for details, see [Link]/
system-requirements.

R u n n i n g C O M S O L M u l t i p h ys i c s

If you are running a Linux version with a graphical desktop environment, you
might find a COMSOL Multiphysics icon that you can simply click to start
COMSOL Multiphysics in the menus. Alternatively, using a terminal window, you
can run the comsol command. If it is not available, ask your system manager to
make it available to you, or, if you have administrative privileges on your Linux
system, add the comsol command to the search path. The setup can do this
automatically for you during installation if you run it with root privileges. The
comsol command is located in the bin folder in the COMSOL installation
directory. This is a typical example of a command that adds comsol to the search
path (assuming you are logged in as root):
ln -s /usr/local/comsol64/multiphysics/bin/comsol /usr/bin/comsol

Multicore Settings

COMSOL Multiphysics supports two modes of parallel operation:

shared-memory parallel operations and distributed-memory parallel operations,
including cluster support for Windows and Linux. This section covers
shared-memory processing, or multithreading, which is important for the
performance of COMSOL Multiphysics computations. Some terms that are
frequently used in when describing multithreading are:
• Core: The core is a processor core used in shared-memory parallelism by a
computational node with multiple processors.

| 117
• Speedup is how many times faster a job runs on N cores compared to 1 core,
on a specific compute node. The speedup depends on the simulation type,
the hardware used, and the hardware drivers used.
On Linux, the default number of processor cores used by COMSOL Multiphysics
is the total number of available physical cores. For example, if you have a 2 x dual
core machine, 4 cores are used in parallel by a COMSOL process.

SHARED - MEMORY OPTIONS

From the Terminal window, use the comsol command option -np to control the
number of cores and processors used. The default is to use all available cores and
processors. For example:
comsol -np 2

launches COMSOL Multiphysics using 2 cores (if available).

You might need to experiment to find the options that work best for your
configuration. For more information see the COMSOL Multiphysics Reference
Manual.

R u n n i n g C O M S O L M u l t i p h ys i c s i n B a t c h M o d e

You can submit COMSOL Multiphysics batch jobs from the COMSOL Desktop
and the command line.
To run a COMSOL Multiphysics batch job from the COMSOL Desktop, you
need to make the Batch feature visible: in the Model Builder tree, click the Show
More Options button ( ) and select Batch and Cluster in the Show More Options
dialog. In the Model Builder, right-click a Study node and select Batch to create
batch jobs.
From a terminal window, you can start batch jobs using the comsol batch
command. This is an example of such a command:
comsol batch -inputfile [Link] -outputfile [Link]

To run a specific study add the command line option -study <tag>, where <tag>
is the tag of the study to run, for instance, std1. To see the tag, click the toolbar
button Model Tree Node Text in the Model Builder and select Tag.
The COMSOL Multiphysics Reference Manual has a dedicated section on
running COMSOL Multiphysics from a terminal window, including a list of
COMSOL commands and associated syntax.

118 |
R u n n i n g C O M S O L M u l t i p h ys i c s i n C l i e n t – S e r v e r M o d e

When you start COMSOL Multiphysics by, for example, entering the comsol
command with no additional arguments, COMSOL Multiphysics is run as a single
application that includes the functionality of both the COMSOL Multiphysics
client and COMSOL Multiphysics server, as explained later in this section.
However, the COMSOL client–server architecture lets you access the COMSOL
Multiphysics server — the COMSOL computational engine — as a separate
process. For example, the COMSOL Desktop can act as a COMSOL Multiphysics
client when connected to a COMSOL Multiphysics server.

The license server is not the same as a COMSOL Multiphysics

server. The license manager can run on a computer different from
both the ones used by COMSOL Desktop and COMSOL
Multiphysics server.

You need a Floating Network License to run the COMSOL Multiphysics server
and the COMSOL Multiphysics client on separate computers. However, any
COMSOL license is sufficient for running the client and the server on the same
computer.
The client and server need not run on the same platform. For example, you can
run the COMSOL Desktop on Windows connecting to a COMSOL Multiphysics
server on a Linux computer. This enables offloading heavy-duty computations
from your personal laptop or desktop to run just the COMSOL Desktop graphical
user interface. A typical use would be to run the COMSOL Multiphysics server on
a computer with large amounts of memory (RAM) and processing power and to
use your personal computer for pre- and postprocessing with the COMSOL
Desktop.

STARTING A COMSOL M ULTIPHYSICS S ERVER

To start the COMSOL Multiphysics server from a terminal window, run the
comsol command with the mphserver argument:
comsol mphserver

You are then prompted for a username and password. You can use any username
and password of your choice, it is only used for connecting a COMSOL
Multiphysics client with a COMSOL Multiphysics server.
When the COMSOL Multiphysics server starts, it listens for a COMSOL
Multiphysics client connection on the port listed in the command window.

| 119
Connecting a COMSOL Multiphysics Client to a COMSOL Multiphysics Server
You can start a COMSOL Multiphysics client session from the COMSOL
Desktop by selecting Connect to Server from the File menu in the COMSOL
Desktop. You can also start a COMSOL Multiphysics client session from a
terminal window by running the comsol command with the client argument:
comsol client

When you start the client, a Connect to COMSOL Multiphysics Server window
appears prompting you for a computer name (Server) where the COMSOL
Multiphysics Server is running, Port number, Username, and Password:

Once you have filled out this information and clicked OK, the COMSOL
Multiphysics server terminal window displays information that a COMSOL
Multiphysics client has connected. For more information on running COMSOL
in client–server mode, see the COMSOL Multiphysics Reference Manual.

Running a Classkit License

To start COMSOL Multiphysics using a Classkit License, start COMSOL

Multiphysics using the -ckl option:
comsol -ckl

Running COMSOL on Clusters

You can launch COMSOL Multiphysics cluster jobs from the COMSOL Desktop
and the command line.

120 |
To run COMSOL Multiphysics on a cluster from the COMSOL Desktop, you
need to make the cluster feature visible: in the Model Builder tree, click the Show
More Options button ( ) and select Batch and Cluster in the Show More Options
dialog. Then in the Model Builder, right-click a Study node and select Cluster
Computing or Cluster Sweep to create cluster jobs. Cluster computing requires a
Floating Network License.
The following terms occur frequently when describing the hardware for cluster
computing and shared memory parallel computing:
• Compute node: The compute nodes are where the distributed computing
occurs. Each distributed COMSOL process resides in a compute node and
communicates with other compute nodes using MPI (message-passing
interface).
• Host: The host is a physical machine (hardware) with a network adapter and
unique network address. The host is part of the cluster. It is sometimes
referred to as a physical node.
• Core: The core is a processor core used in shared-memory parallelism by a
computational node with multiple processors.
The number of used hosts and the number of computational nodes are usually the
same. For some special simulation types, like very small simulations with many
parameters, it might be beneficial to use more than one computational node on
one host.
A tutorial model for cluster testing is included in the Application Libraries window
under COMSOL Multiphysics/Cluster_and_Batch_Tutorials/micromixer_cluster.

QUICK TROUBLESHOOTING
• First, ensure that you have the latest release installed. Check that you have
COMSOL 6.4 or later and make sure to install the latest product updates.
• If you get the error message Process status indicates that process is running,
then cancel any running jobs in the scheduler that you use. In the COMSOL
Desktop, locate the External Process page at the lower-right. Click the Clear
Status button.

For more information about how to run COMSOL Multiphysics in parallel on

Linux clusters, see the COMSOL Multiphysics Reference Manual. For installation
on Clusters, see Cluster Installation.

| 121
R u n n i n g C O M S O L M u l t i p h ys i c s o n t h e C l o u d

COMSOL Multiphysics and COMSOL Server support cloud computing. See

• [Link]/partners-consultants/hpc
• [Link]/model/
running-the-comsol-software-with-amazon-ec2-14075
• [Link]/model/
running-the-comsol-software-with-microsoft-azure-89751

R u n n i n g C O M S O L M u l t i p h ys i c s w i t h M A T L A B

Running COMSOL Multiphysics with MATLAB starts a COMSOL Multiphysics

server and a MATLAB Desktop. No COMSOL graphical user interface is
involved. For a tutorial, see the LiveLink for MATLAB User’s Guide.
To launch MATLAB and connect it to a COMSOL Multiphysics server, run the
command
comsol mphserver matlab

S TARTING COMSOL M ULTIPHYSICS WITH M ATLAB USING THE GRAPHICS

SERVER
To display the plot in a COMSOL graphics window you need to run COMSOL
with MATLAB using the graphics server. To do so, start COMSOL with
MATLAB from a terminal window with the -graphics flag:
comsol mphserver matlab -graphics

R EQUIRED P ROGRAMS FOR R UNNING COMSOL WITH MATLAB

The xterm program is necessary for the command comsol mphserver matlab. The
csh program is needed to call MATLAB functions from COMSOL Multiphysics.
• To install the missing packages on Debian and Ubuntu, type
sudo apt-get install xterm csh

• To install the missing packages on RedHat Enterprise and Fedora, type

sudo yum install xterm tcsh

• To install the missing packages on OpenSUSE, type

sudo zypper install xterm tcsh

122 |
R u n n i n g C O M S O L M u l t i p h ys i c s w i t h S i m u l i n k

Running COMSOL Multiphysics with Simulink starts a COMSOL Multiphysics

server and a MATLAB Desktop. The COMSOL graphical user interface is not
started. For a tutorial, see the Introduction to LiveLink for Simulink manual.
To launch MATLAB and connect it to a COMSOL Multiphysics server, run the
command
comsol mphserver simulink

Note that the Simulink window is not opened by this command.

R EQUIRED P ROGRAMS FOR R UNNING COMSOL WITH S IMULINK

The xterm program is necessary for the command comsol mphserver simulink.
• To install the missing packages on Debian and Ubuntu, type
sudo apt-get install xterm

• To install the missing packages on RedHat Enterprise and Fedora, type

sudo yum install xterm

• To install the missing packages on OpenSUSE, type

sudo zypper install xterm

| 123
COMSOL Security

C O M S O L M u l t i p h y s i c s C li e n t – S e r v e r S e c u r i t y

The COMSOL Multiphysics client–server architecture lets you access the

COMSOL Multiphysics server — the computational engine in COMSOL
Multiphysics — as a separate process. COMSOL Multiphysics client–server uses a
TCP/IP connection to send data between client and server. The COMSOL
Multiphysics server is a single-user server. The design of COMSOL Multiphysics
client–server assumes that you, the user, start both the client and the server
manually. You are responsible for setting a password for mutual authentication of
the client and server. The COMSOL Multiphysics client–server architecture is
designed to operate in a secure environment and has only basic security
incorporated in its design.
You can also access a COMSOL Multiphysics server with the COMSOL API client
in a Java method running in a separate process or a process on a separate computer.
This happens, for example, in the LiveLink™ for MATLAB®, where MATLAB®
loads the COMSOL API client and launches a separate process with the
COMSOL Multiphysics server.

P ASSWORD S ECURITY
You can control if the client–server password is stored on file between sessions. In
the COMSOL Multiphysics client, select the Remember username and password
checkbox in the Connect to COMSOL Multiphysics Server dialog to store the
password between sessions. In the COMSOL Multiphysics server, by using the
option -passwd nostore, you can avoid storing the password on file. If you do not
provide the option, the password will be stored on file, and you will not be asked
to provide it when you start a new server session.
Before storing your password on file, it is hashed by the SHA256 algorithm. This
means that an adversary that gets access to your password file will not easily be able
to obtain the password you originally entered. However, if an adversary gets access
to your password file, the adversary could login on a COMSOL Multiphysics
server started by you, or, potentially, have you log in on a hostile COMSOL
Multiphysics server.
By default, both the COMSOL Multiphysics client and the COMSOL
Multiphysics server write the hashed password to the file .comsol/v64/

124 |
[Link] in your home directory. Both COMSOL Multiphysics client
and server will attempt to make the password file inaccessible for other users by
introducing access restrictions. When you use the client and server on the same
computer there will only be a single password file by default. This could also
happen if you run the client and server on separate computers, if your home
directory is located on a shared network drive.
You should avoid storing your client–server password on file if your home
directory is located on a network drive that does not encrypt network traffic. If
your password is stored on a local drive, your client–server password security will
be improved if the drive is encrypted. Generally, a user with administrative access
to your computer could get access to your password file.
The COMSOL Multiphysics client–server is designed to protect your password
file during network traffic between client and server (see the next section).

TCP/IP C ONNECTION
The TCP/IP communication between client and server is not encrypted.
However, the server and client are mutually authenticated using a challenge
handshake authentication protocol (CHAP), which means that the client–server
password cannot be easily obtained by an adversary that can eavesdrop the
network traffic between client and server.
The TCP connection between the client and the server is otherwise not encrypted.
If you require encryption of the TCP connection, you can use third-party software
based on protocols such as SSH or IPSEC and tunnel the client–server traffic.
When doing this you may need access to the port number used for client–server
communication. The port number is 2036 by default but can be controlled and
modified both from the client and the server.

COMSOL M ULTIPHYSICS S ERVER S ECURITY

When running COMSOL Multiphysics client–server operations from the client,
file system access is typically performed on the client. However, COMSOL
Multiphysics client can potentially access files on the file system and other
operating system resources on the server computer with the same privileges as the
user that launched the Multiphysics server. The COMSOL Multiphysics client–
server security design assumes that the same physical user is operating both the
client and the server and that this user is not an adversary.
In particular, when using the COMSOL API on the client computer, you should
avoid running Java methods, or MATLAB functions with the LiveLink for
MATLAB, that have not been reviewed from a security point of view. Some
operations on the COMSOL Multiphysics server will read and write files on the
client and server computer, and other operations may run operating system

| 125
commands or initiate network traffic on the client or server computer. These
operations are performed with the same privileges as the user that started the
COMSOL Multiphysics client or server.
When running model methods or add-ins in for COMSOL Multiphysics client–
server, these are run using the security settings for applications (see the next
section).

Application and Physics Builder Security

Models and applications can be protected with the AES256 encryption algorithm
using passwords for running and editing. For applications without a running
password, the model or application is decrypted using a secret but hard-coded
password. To achieve the highest security, use both an editing and a running
password.
Protecting a model or application only encrypts the XML data structure that
represents the Model Builder and the Application Builder data structures.
Auxiliary data structures describing the geometry, mesh, and solution are not
encrypted.
Compiled physics builder files are obfuscated with the AES256 encryption
algorithm using a hard-coded password.

Me thod Security

You can use the Application Builder to write Java methods that are run from
applications, model methods, and add-ins. When you run those methods, the
privileges of the methods are controlled by the security settings that you find in
the Preferences window under Security in the COMSOL Multiphysics desktop.
The security settings will apply to all applications, model methods, and add-ins
that you load in COMSOL Multiphysics.
Note that any MPH file may contain applications, model methods, and add-ins. If
you intend to load an MPH file from an unreliable source, you should enable all
security features. You can do that by reverting to Factory Settings and clearing all
checkboxes under General in the security settings, and finally clicking OK.

126 |
S ECURITY S ETTINGS
If your MPH files come from reliable sources or you make them yourself, you can
keep the factory settings for security. If you write methods that require additional
system access, you can give methods more privileges, but you should revert to the
original settings if the situation changes. Find a general description of the security
settings in the section Security Settings in the COMSOL Multiphysics Reference
Manual.

A DD -I N S ECURITY
For add-ins that require extended privileges permanently, you can disable all
security settings for certain methods in the add-in by using the comsoltrust
command. This command makes it possible to maintain restricted security settings
for applications generally but allow certain adds-in to operate.

E MAIL P ASSWORD
When your password to the SMTP email server is stored as preference, the
behavior is operating system dependent.
Windows
The password is encrypted using the built-in Windows data protection mechanism
for the current user. The encrypted password is stored in the preference files
%USERPROFILE%\.comsol\v64\[Link] and
%USERPROFILE%\.comsol\v64\[Link].

Mac and Linux

The password is encrypted using an autogenerated password. The encrypted
password is stored in the preference files $HOME/.comsol/v64/[Link] and
$HOME/.comsol/v64/[Link]. The autogenerated password is stored
in the read-protected file $HOME/.comsol/v64/[Link].

COMSOL Server Security

For information about COMSOL Server security, see the section Security in the
COMSOL Server Manual.

| 127
Troubleshooting License Errors

If you have questions or problems with your installation, start by checking the
COMSOL Support Knowledge Base at [Link]/support/
knowledgebase for up-to-date information about installation and license issues. If
this does not help, then please contact COMSOL technical support at
support@[Link].

THE COMSOL SUPPORT KNOWLEDGE BASE

The most important Knowledge Base entries for installation questions and license
errors are the following:

SUBJECT KNOWLEDGE BASE ENTRY

Could not obtain license for [Link]/support/knowledgebase/903

COMSOL Multiphysics GUI
Running COMSOL in parallel [Link]/support/knowledgebase/1001
on clusters
Updating the COMSOL [Link]/support/knowledgebase/1022
License Manager
COMSOL Installation [Link]/support/learning-center/
Companion article/comsol-Installation-Companion-58101
Error: An error has occurred. [Link]/support/knowledgebase/1083
See the log file C:\Users...
Selecting hardware for [Link]/support/knowledgebase/1116
clusters
Error: Error downloading file. [Link]/support/knowledgebase/1149
Connection refused: connect

You can also view videos about installation at: [Link]/

videos?workflow%5B%5D=workflowstep-install.

L ICENSE E RRORS
This section summarizes the most common postinstallation error messages
generated by the COMSOL software, and it gives some advice how to
troubleshoot them. For a complete list of error messages, see the FlexNet license
manager documentation. This documentation is shipped with your COMSOL
installation; see FlexNet® License Manager Documentation on where to find it.

128 |
If you need to review the license manager log file, or send it to COMSOL
technical support, this is where you usually find it (depending on choices you
made during the installation):
• Windows: C:\ProgramData\COMSOL\[Link].
• macOS: /var/tmp/[Link]
• Linux: /var/tmp/[Link]
If you need to access the license file, this is where you usually find it:
• Windows:
C:\Program Files\COMSOL\COMSOL64\Multiphysics\license\[Link]
• macOS: /Applications/COMSOL64/Multiphysics/license/[Link]
• Linux: /usr/local/comsol64/multiphysics/license/[Link]

ERROR MESSAGE EXPLANATION

License error A general license error has occurred. Check the error message for
details that might help solve the problem. If you need help in
interpreting the information, see the FlexNet license manager
documentation or send the complete error message to
support@[Link].
License error: -1. The license file is missing or your system settings do not allow you to
Cannot find license read the file. Review the license manager installation steps above and
file. check that you have administrative rights on your computer.
License error: -2. There is a formatting problem with your license file. This can happen if
Invalid license file you edit it with a word processing software such as Microsoft Word
syntax. which inserts extra (invisible) characters. Use a plain text editor
instead (on Windows: Notepad, WordPad, or similar). Formatting
problems can also happen if the file is damaged while being copied or
emailed from one computer to another.
License error: -4. The license manager has detected that all available licenses of a
Licensed number certain COMSOL product have been used by other users. Contact
of users already your license administrator and report this problem. You might need
reached. more licenses of one of the add-on products.
License error: -5. The license manager has encountered a problem during startup.
No such feature Check the license manager log file for error messages.
exists. Please send the log file to support@[Link] if you want help in
interpreting the information.
NOTE: The license manager creates the log file. If there is no log file,
make sure to first start the license manager. Please refer to one of the
License Manager Installation sections of this manual for instructions
how to install and start the COMSOL license manager.

| 129
 ERROR MESSAGE EXPLANATION

License error: -10. This error message indicates that you have a time-limited (trial) license
Feature has and that your license has expired. Contact your license administrator
expired. to see if a more recent license file is available. You can also contact a
COMSOL representative to renew your time-limited license.
License error: -12. Check that no firewall on the COMSOL client is preventing the
Invalid returned connection from the COMSOL client to the license server.
data from license Temporarily disable any firewall on the COMSOL client to see if that
server system. helps.
Check that no firewall on the license server is preventing the
connection from the COMSOL client computer to the license
manager, or the connection from the lmgrd daemon and the
LMCOMSOL daemon.
If the problems remain, send the license manager log file to
support@[Link].

130 |
ERROR MESSAGE EXPLANATION

License error: -15. The license manager has not been installed or started yet. If the first
Cannot connect to line of your [Link] file looks like this:
license server SERVER mylicserver 000123456789 1718
system. a license manager is required. Please refer to the License Manager
Installation sections of this manual for instructions on how to install
and start the COMSOL license manager.
Check that no firewall on the COMSOL client is preventing the
connection from the COMSOL client to the license server.
Temporarily disable any firewall on the COMSOL client to see if that
helps.
Check that no firewall on the license server is preventing the
connection from the COMSOL client computer to the license
manager.
Check that the [Link] file on the COMSOL client computer
points to the correct license server hostname. First, find the
[Link] according to the instructions above.
Check that the first line has the correct license server hostname. For
example, if your license server hostname is apollo, the first row in
the [Link] file should look like this:
SERVER apollo 000123456789 1718
If the COMSOL client computer does not recognize apollo as a
proper hostname, it might help to instead use the fully qualified
domain name ([Link]) or the IP address. If
neither of these work, there might be a problem with DNS or the
HOSTS file on the client. Please ask your system administrator for
advice on how to connect with TCP/IP to the license server.
Finally, the license manager might have encountered a problem during
startup. Check the license manager log file for error messages.
NOTE: The log file is created by the license manager after it has been
started.
Please send the log file to support@[Link] if you want help in
interpreting the information.
For information about a loss of connection to the license server while
running the COMSOL Multiphysics software, see License Server
Interruptions below.
License error: -39. The error means that your username does not match the one listed in
User/host not on the license manager options file, [Link]. To get access to
INCLUDE list for COMSOL, ask your license/system administrator for help. When the
feature. username in the options file is changed, the license manager must be
shut down and restarted to give the new user immediate access to
COMSOL.

| 131
 ERROR MESSAGE EXPLANATION

License error: -88. The software has detected that a system clock has been set back.
System clock has Please make sure that your computer’s clock is set to the current local
been set back. time and date. If the problem remains check that there are no files on
your hard drive that have a future date.
License error: -96. Please make sure that the SERVER hostname in the [Link]
License server file is valid and that the TCP/IP network connection between the
machine is down application computer and the license server is working properly.
or not responding. This error could also indicate that your firewall is not configured
properly in order to let the license manager and vendor daemon
network traffic through (typically ports 1718 and 1719). It could also
indicate problems with other network security settings. Contact your
systems administrator for help.
License error: -97. The license manager has encountered a problem during startup.
The desired Check the license manager log file for error messages.
vendor daemon is NOTE: The log file is created by the license manager after it has been
down. started.
Please send the log file to support@[Link] if you want help in
interpreting the information.

L ICENSE S ERVER I NTERRUPTIONS

If the license server does not respond during a COMSOL Multiphysics session so
that the COMSOL Multiphysics software cannot connect to the license server,
you will see the following effects:
• The following error message appears after a few minutes:

Click Save and Exit to save the current COMSOL Multiphysics model and then
exit, or click Exit to exit from the COMSOL Desktop without saving. You could
also wait to see if the connection can be reestablished. If you choose to save the
mode, you get a choice of location for the file. In addition, if there are models
on the server that are not used by the COMSOL Desktop, they are saved
immediately in their original locations with autosaved appended to their

132 |
 filenames in order not to overwrite the original files. Models that have never
been saved are saved in the recovery folder also when recovery is not enabled.
However, if there is no recovery file and the program has stopped when
executing a runnable, it is not possible to save the model. If you are running a
COMSOL batch job, the output file is used if it is not identical to the input file.
• As soon as the connection to the license servers has been lost, you will not
be able to add feature nodes with license requirements to the Model Builder.
Trying to add such nodes result in an error message such as “Could not
obtain license for Floating Potential 1 {fb1}, Required product: AC/DC
Module” and a license error -15 (see list of license errors above).

| 133
134 |
Index

A add feature 21 comment line, license file 55

Application Library Update Community Discussion Forum 15
configuring on Linux 108 compute node 75
configuring on macOS 84 COMSOL Access 15
configuring on Windows 43 COMSOL Client
AutoCAD macOS 97
LiveLink for 44 Windows, connecting 73
Autodesk Inventor comsol command, Linux 117
LiveLink for 45 comsol command, macOS 95
automated installation COMSOL Compiler 13
Linux 107 COMSOL Conference 15
macOS 82 COMSOL Exchange 15
Windows 42 COMSOL Multiphysics Client
automated license manager installation Linux, connecting 120
Linux license server 113 macOS, connecting 97
macOS license server 89 Windows 69
Windows license server 63 Windows, running 72
automated updates 42 COMSOL Multiphysics Server

B Bourne shell commands 113 Linux, running 119

browser, Linux file 106

Linux, running with MATLAB 122,
123
C change license, with COMSOL installer
Linux, starting 119
21
macOS 94
changing the license
macOS, running 96
Linux 115
macOS, starting 97
macOS 91
Windows 69
Windows 66
Windows, running 71
Classkit License
Windows, running with MATLAB 77
desktop shortcuts 70
Windows, running with Simulink 77
Linux 120
COMSOL Server 13
macOS 95
COMSOL Software License Agree-
Windows 69
ment 11
cluster computing
COMSOL Video Center 9
Linux 95, 121
COMSOL with MATLAB
macOS 99
desktop shortcuts 71
Windows 75
COMSOL with Simulink

| 135
 desktop shortcuts 71 utility program, macOS 87
configuring license features 61 utility program, Windows 53
core 75 Floating Network License
CPU-Locked Single User License 12 definition 12
cross-platform user interface 68, 70 Linux, client servers and 119
csh program 122 Linux, clusters and 95, 121
Linux, clusters installation and 85, 109
D dongle 15
macOS, client server and 97
downloading product 9
macOS, clusters and 100
Linux 101
management software 14
Linux, DVD 104
Windows, client server and 72
macOS 78
Windows, cluster installation and 50
troubleshooting 128
Windows, clusters and 75
Windows 16
Windows, definition 52
Windows, DVD 19
H hard disk serial number 17
E errors, license 128
hardware lock 15
Ethernet address
host 75
Linux 102
hostid
macOS 92
Linux, changing licenses 115
Windows 17
Linux, Internet installations 102
Windows, changing license and 66
macOS, changing licenses 92
Excel
macOS, Internet installations 79
LiveLink for 44
Windows, changing licenses 66
F FEATURE line, license file 56
Windows, Internet installations 17
FlexNet
Windows, license server and 55
control panel 53
I idle timeout 61
License Administration Guide, Linux
INCREMENT line, license file 56
110
installation
License Administration Guide, ma-
Linux 101
cOS 87
macOS 78
License Administration Guide, Win-
media options 9
dows 54
previous 10
license manager 14
Windows 16
license manager, troubleshooting 128
license manager, Windows 52 J Java runtime, custom 29
management, Linux 110
K Knowledge Base 9
management, macOS 87
COMSOL Access, and 15
management, Windows 53
troubleshooting 128
utility program, Linux 110

136 |
L Learning Center 9 Windows, starting 64
License Agreement 9 license server
license agreement 11 Linux, client server and 119
license errors 128 Windows, and 22
license feature name 56 Windows, client server and 72
license file license, changing
comment line 55 Linux 115
example of 18 macOS 91
FEATURE line 56 Windows 66
FlexNet, and 14 [Link]
INCREMENT line 56 FlexNet, and 14
macOS, obtaining 80 Linux 111
SERIAL line 56 Linux, changing 115
SERVER line 55 macOS 87
troubleshooting 129 macOS, changing 92
USE_SERVER line 55 troubleshooting 129
VENDOR line 55 Windows 54
Windows, obtaining 17 Windows, FlexNet and 53
license manager LiveLink for
automated installation on Linux 113 AutoCAD 44
automated installation on macOS 89 Autodesk Inventor 45
automated installation on Windows Excel 44
63 PTC Creo Parametric 46
daemon, Linux 110 Revit 47
daemon, macOS 87 Solid Edge 48
daemon, Windows 53 SOLIDWORKS 49
files for installation, Linux 111 [Link] Linux 110
files for installation, macOS 88 [Link] macOS 87
files for installation, Windows 62 [Link] Windows 53
installing files, Linux 111 lmhostid
installing files, macOS 88 Linux 115
installing files, Windows 62 macOS 92
Linux, log file 113 lmutil
Linux, starting 113 Windows 66
log file 64 lmutil Linux 110
log file, troubleshooting 129 lmutil macOS 87
macOS, log file 90 lmutil Windows 53
macOS, starting 90 log file, license manager 64
Windows, log file 65 log file, Linux 113

| 137
 log file, macOS 90 COMSOL Access, and 15
log file, troubleshooting 129 proxy server
log file, Windows 65 for software updates 41
Linux installations 108
M MAC address
macOS installations 84
Linux installations 102
Windows installations 28
macOS installations 92
PTC Creo Parametric
Windows installations 17, 66
LiveLink for 46
MATLAB
Linux, changing path to 108 R remove feature 21
macOS, changing path to 84 Revit
running COMSOL Multiphysics on LiveLink for 47
Linux with 122 root 113
running COMSOL Multiphysics on
S SERIAL line, license file 56
macOS with 94
SERVER line, license file 55
running COMSOL Multiphysics on
shared-memory computing 11
Windows with 76
software license agreement 11
Windows, changing path to 77
Solid Edge
merged license file 24
LiveLink for 48
multicore computing 11
SOLIDWORKS
multiprocessor computing 11
LiveLink for 49
N Named Single User License system requirements 9, 10
definition 12
T technical support, contacting 128
Linux, and 105, 111
technical support, website 9
O operating system 11 three-server redundancy 22
options file 111 timeout, of licenses 61
trial license
P passcode 16
Linux 102
physical address 17
macOS 78, 101
port number 22
Windows 16
previous installation 10
troubleshooting license errors 128
product downloads 9
tutorials, installation 128
COMSOL Access, and 15
tutorials, videos 9
Linux 101
Linux, DVD 104 U uninstalling COMSOL
macOS 78 Linux 107
troubleshooting 128 macOS 83
Windows 16 Windows 39
Windows, DVD 19 updates, product 9
product updates 9 COMSOL Access 15

138 |
 USE_SERVER line, license file 55
user interface, cross-platform 68, 70
utility program, Linux 110
utility program, macOS 87
utility program, Windows 53

V vendor daemon
Linux installations 110
macOS installations 87
Windows installations 53
VENDOR line, license file 55
videos
installation 128
tutorials 9
volume serial number 17

W web browsers, for Linux 106

X xterm program 122, 123

| 139
140 |