How do I find my computer's host id?

As the title asks, how do I find my computer's host id?

Answer 1

[Star Strider]

In Windows, it is the volume serial number for the C:\ drive.

To get it, run this from a script or the MATLAB Command Window:

system('vol')

The result will appear in the Command Window. You can copy and paste it from there, as necessary.

Note that in the MATLAB License Center, the number appears without the hyphen. That causes no problems for MATLAB.

[Brett Kercher]

Thanks for replying. However, I get the following when running "system('vol')" from the command line: 'system' is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file.'

[Brett Kercher]

The line to run it was just 'vol', not 'system('vol')'. Thank you for the help!

[Star Strider]

My pleasure.

The code I posted:

system('vol')

ran for me without error in MATLAB R2019b just now.

If you are using the Windows Command Prompt, not MATLAB, then vol is all that is necessary.

[Guillaume]

From matlab command prompt you have to use system('vol') as Star said

From windows command prompt, of course you don't use system, but if your question is how to do that from the windows command prompt, why are you asking this in a matlab forum?

[Walter Roberson]

Windows can use either the volume serial number or the ethernet MAC address. Volume serial number is getting less common.

[Star Strider]

@Guillaume — Thank you!

[Andrew Janke]

Does anyone know how to tell, for a particular computer or Matlab activation, whether Matlab is using the disk serial number or the MAC address (or both) as the Host ID or other identification for activation? And whether the "Host ID" is the same thing in all contexts?

I ask because I'm having some trouble with activation management for VMs in Azure. I have a Standalone license with 4 activations allowed. In the mathworks.com License Center page, it shows me 4 activations, but 3 of them are shown as having the same Host ID (in the Host ID column in the Activated Computers list, and in the Host ID field of the Activation Details page for each). The number shown for Host ID there is the same as the Disk Serial Number shown for them; only the MAC address in the details page differentiates which computer each activation is for.

I think this is because volume serial numbers are not unique. And you can run in to that in Azure (and other cloud scenarios) because new VMs may be created by cloning a disk snapshot of the OS disk, so all the VMs created from a given disk image source may have the same volume serial number for their C: drives.

For me, sometimes the Deactivate Matlab program won't successfully get one of those activations to disappear from the list in License Center, and sometimes I can't activate Matlab on the same VM for which an activation is already listed in License Center and I get a "no activations remaining" error. I'm wondering if this duplicate volume serial number/Host ID behavior could have something to do with that.