Installation

System Requirements

zCFD is supported on the following Linux distributions:

  • RHEL 7+

  • CentOS 7+

  • Ubuntu 20.04+

  • Windows 10/11 via WSL2

By default zCFD is compiled for x86_64 but is available for ARM and IBM Power on request.

GPU support

zCFD supports running on NVidia GPUs with a compute capability of 6.1 and above (See Compute Capability ).

An AMD GPU (HIP) based version is available on request.

Linux / Unix

If you are running Linux/Unix zCFD is provided as a stand-alone installer containing all the packages required to get started. The installer is available for download from the zCFD website. Once the zCFD installer has been downloaded run the install script and follow the prompts.

$ bash zCFD-icx-sse-impi-<INSTALL_VERSION>-Linux-64bit.sh

Then copy the license file provided over email into the lic folder in the install directory.

$ cp zcfd.lic /<path to zCFD install>/lic/

Once zCFD has been installed the zCFD environment can be activated from a bash shell:

$ source /<path to zCFD install>/bin/activate
(zCFD)$

Windows

zCFD can be run locally on windows machines if Windows Subsystem for Linux 2 (WSL2) is installed. To install WSL2 simply follow the Microsoft instructions which can be found here.

The chosen Linux distribution shouldn’t have an effect on how the code runs, but the Linux distributions listed above are supported.

In order to access your Linux filesystem on Windows it can be useful to add a quick access link in file explorer. To do this, in the address in file explorer enter

\\wsl$\

This will show you show you the root folders for your installed Linux distributions.

The installer is available for download from the zCFD website. For WSL, download the standard Linux distribution. Once the zCFD installer has been downloaded run the install script from within the WSL2 environment and follow the prompts.

$ bash zCFD-icc-sse-impi-<INSTALL_VERSION>-Linux-64bit.sh

Then copy the license file provided over email into the lic folder in the install directory.

$ cp zcfd.lic /<path to zCFD install>/lic/

Once zCFD has been installed the zCFD environment can be activated:

$ source /<path to zCFD install>/bin/activate
(zCFD)$

Licence

zCFD requires a license. If you do not already have a license, please contact zcfd@zenotech.com to obtain one. When zCFD starts it will look in the following locations for a licence file:

  1. ‘zcfd.lic’ in the directory alongside the input files

  2. ‘zcfd.lic’ in the lic directory of the zCFD installation. i.e. /<path to zCFD install>/lic/

  3. RLM_LICENSE environment variable

The RLM_LICENSE environment variable can be defined as below.

export RLM_LICENSE=/path/to/license/file

or, where port is the port number in the license file, and host is the hostname in the license file

export RLM_LICENSE=port@server

In the case that the system running the simulation cannot access the internet a local license server will be required. See http://www.reprisesoftware.com/admin/software-licensing.php for details.

Licence Error codes

Below is a list of some of the error codes that you may encounter due to licensing errors. If the error code you receive is not listed, please contact us.

Error Code

Description

Possible Remedy

-3

License has expired

Contact us to renew your license

-6

Requested version is not supported

Your license is for an older product version; contact us to upgrade

-8

checkout request for too many licenses

Reduce the number of ranks that you are running the solver on or stop any existing running processes.

-21

No heartbeat

The license heartbeat was not received; check that the license server is still running and that have connectivity to it

-22

All licenses in use

All licenses are currently in use; stop any running processes to free up a license.

-37

License start date has not been reached

Your license has not yet become valid. Contact us if you believe this to be in error

-102

Can’t read license data

Check the permissions on the license file on the server

-103

Network error

Check that you have connectivity to the license server; this may involve opening a port on your firewall or connecting to the internet

-104

Error writing to network

Check your connectivity to the license server; check firewall settings and any endpoint security software you may be running

-105

Error reading from network

Check your connectivity to the license server; check firewall settings and any endpoint security software you may be running

-106

Unexpected response from license server

Check that your license configuration is pointing to the correct server

-107

HELLO message for wrong server

Check that your license configuration is pointing to the correct server

-108

Error in private key

There is an issue with your server side license file - contact us to resolve this issue

-109

Error signing authorization

There is an issue with your server side license file - contact us to resolve this issue

-110

Internal error

An error occurred in the license server - contact us if this error repeats itself

-111

Connection refused at server

Check your firewall settings and that you are pointing at the correct license server

-112

No server to connect to

Check that the server is running and that you are pointing at the correct license server

-113

Bad Communication handshake

Check that the server is running and that you are pointing at the correct license server

-114

Can’t get ethernet address

Check that the user that you are running as has correct permissions to query the network card