Has anyone succeeded running Questa Starter with license file?

Another dead end to this issue. If we can't even get the starter edition working, why would we risk a purchase of Questa? Can someone at Intel fix the "Self Service" Licensing Center or post a solution that works please? I have received no email either - the SSLC is an endless non-functional loop:

email recieved after 12 hours with a link to where I started:

Link takes me back here and around and around we go:

(chat support is no help - points to this forum)

What a disaster.

I first met flexlm almost 30 years ago and have used it on several systems and architectures in a big national laboratory environment. I thought I knew all the tricks. Every thing looks right, the suggested diagnostic doesn't complain. Uncle already!!!!

I am seething, I have been doing this for over a decade and never has the experience of setting up a basic simulation environment been so maddening, I have already wasted the better part of a working day trying to guess why questa_fse can't checkout a license.

Tried on Ubuntu 22.4 (which, surprise, is apparently supported by Quartus but not by Questa), RHEL7, RHEL8, RHEL9... both 22.1 standard and 22.4 pro.

There is no way Gelsinger can turn this ship around anymore.

I am having issues with this too on Ubuntu 22.04. I got a FIXED license in the self-service portal, set the LM_LICENSE_FILE environment variable as instructed, but still cannot launch Questa Starter from Quartus Prime Lite. It just doesn't launch anything.

I tried to launch Questa manually from the terminal by running "vsim" (I can do this for ModelSim Starter), but I get a licensing error, as seen in the snippet below (note that I replaced my MAC address with "xxxxxxxxxxxx"). It seems "lmutil lmdiag" isn't doing anything useful.

It looks to me that the license file I am receiving from the self service portal is incomplete. It doesn't seem to have any keys on it, nor a "FEATURE" entry, like in other sample files I have seen online. I believe there are two entries because I generated a second license in an attempt to fix the issue.

Can someone at Intel check if the licensing portal is doing the right thing? I think I followed all the steps to create the license, and the online help is not very helpful at this point anymore. Is this even a valid license file? If not, why?

luis@tesla-ubuntu:~/intelFPGA_lite/22.1std/questa_fse/linux_x86_64$ ./vsim
Unable to checkout a license. Make sure your license file environment variable (e.g., LM_LICENSE_FILE)
is set correctly and then run 'lmutil lmdiag' to diagnose the problem.
Unable to checkout a license.  Vsim is closing.
** Error: Invalid license environment. Application closing.
luis@tesla-ubuntu:~/intelFPGA_lite/22.1std/questa_fse/linux_x86_64$ echo $LM_LICENSE_FILE 
/home/luis/intelFPGA_licenses/xxxxxxxxxxxx_License.dat
luis@tesla-ubuntu:~/intelFPGA_lite/22.1std/questa_fse/linux_x86_64$ cat $LM_LICENSE_FILE 
# Intel Corporation Software and/or Intellectual Property License File
# Issued 03 February 2023
# Upgrade to these products will no longer be available after the Maintenance Expiration  
# date unless licenses are renewed.  
# Fixed Node License
# Primary Machine Name-Tesla
# Primary Machine ID-NIC ID xxxxxxxxxxxx
# Companion ID-N/A
# Companion ID 2-N/A
# Product License Summary:
# Questasim*-Intel FPGA Starter Edition, 1 Seat(s)
# - Maintenance Expiration of 2024.02
# - License Expires 03-Feb-2024
# Questasim*-Intel FPGA Starter Edition, 1 Seat(s)
# - Maintenance Expiration of 2024.02
# - License Expires 03-Feb-2024
################################################################################ 
# FEATURE START 
# This is license file for Questasim*-Intel FPGA Starter Edition 
# Number of seat licenses is 1 
# License Expires 03-Feb-2024 
# FEATURE END 
################################################################################
# FEATURE START 
# This is license file for Questasim*-Intel FPGA Starter Edition 
# Number of seat licenses is 1 
# License Expires 03-Feb-2024 
# FEATURE END 
################################################################################
# End of Intel Corporation Software and/or Intellectual Property License File. Issued 02/03/2023
luis@tesla-ubuntu:~/intelFPGA_lite/22.1std/questa_fse/linux_x86_64$ ./lmutil lmdiag 
lmutil - Copyright (c) 1989-2019 Flexera. All Rights Reserved.
FlexNet diagnostics on Fri 2/3/2023 22:16

-----------------------------------------------------
License file: /home/luis/intelFPGA_licenses/xxxxxxxxxxxx_License.dat
-----------------------------------------------------
luis@tesla-ubuntu:~/intelFPGA_lite/22.1std/questa_fse/linux_x86_64$

Having checked out a few other posts here it seems fairly likely that many people are seeing the exact same issue, we're all just getting blank license files. Is there actually a place to get some support or because it's a free license the only support is to post here and hope an Intel employee take pity on us?

For my part I've moved back to modelsim using a post from 2 years ago telling you how to get it to run in a 64 bit operating system but that's honestly pretty sad. I've also posted my 'license' file here in the hope that an employee looking at the thread will have plenty of examples to send to the license team to get the license server fixed. And yes I tried lots of different things which is why I now have 3 non-licenses in there. I think we're all agreed here now that those license files are all comments and there are no actual license lines in them.

# Intel Corporation Software and/or Intellectual Property License File
# Issued 03 February 2023
# Upgrade to these products will no longer be available after the Maintenance Expiration
# date unless licenses are renewed.
# Fixed Node License
# Primary Machine Name-******
# Primary Machine ID-NIC ID ******************
# Companion ID-N/A
# Companion ID 2-N/A
# Product License Summary:
# Questasim*-Intel FPGA Starter Edition, 1 Seat(s)
# - Maintenance Expiration of 2024.02
# - License Expires 03-Feb-2024
# Questasim*-Intel FPGA Starter Edition, 1 Seat(s)
# - Maintenance Expiration of 2024.02
# - License Expires 03-Feb-2024
# Questasim*-Intel FPGA Starter Edition, 1 Seat(s)
# - Maintenance Expiration of 2024.02
# - License Expires 03-Feb-2024
################################################################################
# FEATURE START
# This is license file for Questasim*-Intel FPGA Starter Edition
# Number of seat licenses is 1
# License Expires 03-Feb-2024
# FEATURE END
################################################################################
# FEATURE START
# This is license file for Questasim*-Intel FPGA Starter Edition
# Number of seat licenses is 1
# License Expires 03-Feb-2024
# FEATURE END
################################################################################
# FEATURE START
# This is license file for Questasim*-Intel FPGA Starter Edition
# Number of seat licenses is 1
# License Expires 03-Feb-2024
# FEATURE END
################################################################################
# End of Intel Corporation Software and/or Intellectual Property License File. Issued 02/03/2023

Same empty license files. Contain only comments. No licenses.

Dear Intel, please do something about it.

same problem

Yep - same problem, waste of an hour.