How to activate Sisense license without web access

[Andrii_Logvin]

How to activate Sisense license without web access

This article explains how you can activate a license in your new Sisense installation without access to the Sisense website in the browser.

Usual activation

In the usual activation, you must navigate to the Sisense URL (printed in the installation logs) to enter your license credentials or specify your offline activation key in the browser.

When to use

Sometimes, you may want to configure Sisense settings or restore a backup before granting access to the Sisense web application. 

Restoring a backup requires your Sisense installation to be already activated. In case you would like to block web access to the application before the backup is restored, you can follow the steps below to activate the license from the server side.

Activation steps

You will need access to the machine with configured kubectl commands (bastion machine in Cloud installation or cluster machine for on-prem Kubernetes deployments)..

1. Ensure that api-gateway pod is running in the system:
   kubectl get po -n sisense -l app=api-gateway
2. Execute into the api-gateway pod (in case there are multiple replicas, you can enter any of the pods):
   kubectl exec -it -n sisense  $(kubectl get po -n sisense -l app=api-gateway -o name | tail -n 1) -- bash
   Note. If you use a non-default namespace, replace -n sisense with the correct namespace name.
3. Use the following command to activate your license (replace email and password with your license credentials):
   curl 'http://localhost:8456/license/activate' \

 -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \

 --data-raw '{"email":"your_license@sisense.com","password":"pass"}' 

1. Wait until all pods transition from Init:4/6 to Running state:
   kubectl get po -n sisense -w

You can activate a license in your Sisense installation by sending a request from within the API gateway container instead of a public web request. This method can be used to prevent access to the web application until the backup is restored in a new environment.

Related Resources: 

• https://docs.sisense.com/main/SisenseLinux/activating-sisense-on-linux.htm 

Disclaimer: This post outlines a potential custom workaround for a specific use case or provides instructions regarding a specific task. The solution may not work in all scenarios or Sisense versions, so we strongly recommend testing it in your environment before deployment. If you need further assistance with this please let us know.