The hserver client helper or proxy program which communicates with the local or remote sesinetd (license server). In a client/server model, hserver is the client and sesientd is the server. The hserver program is included in every Houdini installation. It is automatically started when a Houdini application is first launched.

On Windows, the hserver program is normally installed as a service called HoudiniServer. Starting with Houdini 18.5.500, hserver can be run as a non-service application similar to hserver on Linux/OSX. This feature is opt-in and is based on if the service is installed which tells hserver if it should be run as a service or not.

For configuration options, including hserver logging, please refer to the hserver documentation.

How can hserver be used?

Change the license server the client uses

hserver -S servername

License server chaining

This configuration allows the client to query multiple license servers. This allows license servers to be broken up based on whatever specification you may have (i.e. license product type). For more information on chaining please refer to the online documentation

hserver -S "licenseserverA;licenseserverB"

HTTP communication

To enable http communication for the HoudiniServer specify the protocol in the connection url. For more information on HTTP communication with hserver, please refer to the online documentation.

hserver -S http://licenseservername

What port does hserver use?

hserver uses TCP port 1714
The license server daemon sesinetd uses TCP port 1715