Problem Note 56754: The SAS® Renewal Utility for SAS® software fails and the setinit.log file contains "ERROR: A lock is not available for SASHELP.CORE.CATALOG"
Details        About        Rate It       
For SAS® 9.2, SAS® 9.3, and SAS® 9.4, running the SAS Renewal Utility for your SAS software might produce a setinit failure error or a renew failure message. And the setinit.log file indicated in the error message might contain ERROR: A lock is not available for sashelp.core.catalog.

The complete error might appear as follows:

ERROR: User does not have appropriate authorization level for file SASHELP.CORE.CATALOG.

ERROR: A lock is not available for SASHELP.CORE.CATALOG.

ERROR: The site validation data cannot be updated. This is most likely due to the fact
that the SASHELP catalog is not available in write mode, and/or that the
SETINIT option has not been specified when using the SAS command.

ERROR: Difficulty reading the site validation data.

To correct this issue, do the following:

Make sure that all SAS and SAS® Enterprise Guide® sessions are closed. Make sure that SAS® Deployment Manager is closed. If remote SAS Enterprise Guide sessions are connecting to SAS on this machine, make sure that all remote SAS Enterprise Guide sessions are closed too.

If SAS is completely expired, close any expiration error messages that are displayed when you attempt to open SAS. (See SAS Note 52302, "An error message indicates that your SAS® software license has expired and a subsequent message says that your core.sas7bcat file is locked.")

Reboot the machine and verify that all SAS.EXE processes are closed. To verify that all SAS.EXE processes are stopped, start the Task Manager and click the Details tab. Click the column heading Name to alphabetize the list of process names. If available, select the check box for Show processes from all users at the bottom of the screen. Look for SAS.EXE, SASDM.exe, and SEGUIDE.EXE processes. If any are listed, click on each one to highlight it. Then, right-click the process and choose End Task, in order to close all SAS and SAS Enterprise Guide sessions associated with each SAS.EXE process.

Make sure that you are signed in to Microsoft Windows with a user ID that has local administrator rights.

To start the renewal process, right-click Renew SAS Software and select Run as administrator. For SAS® 9.4M3 (TS1M3) and higher, an alternate method is to go to C:\Program files\SASHome\SASDeploymentManager\9.4\ and right-click SASDM.EXE and select Run as administrator. Select Renew SAS Software and click Next. Browse to the SAS License file for the same SAS site number that is currently installed. Complete the process.

If the error persists, make sure that the CORE.SAS7BCAT file is not set to Read-only. Here are the default locations:
For SAS 9.4:
C:\program files\SASHome\SASFoundation\9.4\core\sashelp\
C:\program files\SASHome\x86\SASFoundation\9.4\core\sashelp\

Remove the Read-only setting, if necessary.

If the error persists, make sure that the setinit.log file is not set to Read-only. Remove the Read-only setting, if necessary. Here are the default locations:
For SAS 9.4:
C:\program files\SASHome\SASFoundation\9.4\
C:\program files\SASHome\x86\SASFoundation\9.4\

If the error persists, make sure that the setinit.sss file and, if it exists, the SID.txt file is not set to Read-only. Remove the Read-only setting, if necessary. Here are the default locations:
For SAS 9.4:
C:\program files\SASHome\SASFoundation\9.4\core\SASInst\
C:\program files\SASHome\x86\SASFoundation\9.4\core\SASInst\

Make sure that the user ID that is logged in has full permissions to these folders and to the CORE.SAS7BCAT file and that the user ID is not in a Windows group that limits these permissions. IMPORTANT: Go to the folder that contains CORE.SAS7BCAT. Right-click this file and choose Copy. Then, right-click and choose Paste in the same folder location. That should successfully create a copy of this file in the same folder.

Start the renewal process again by right-clicking Renew SAS Software and select Run as administrator.

If the same error occurs, turn off User Account Control, reboot the machine, and renew SAS again. To turn off User Account Control, do the following:
Click Start and in the search box, enter change user account control.
Choose Change User Account Control settings. If asked to allow, click Yes.
Slide to Never Notify and click OK.
Reboot the machine and renew SAS.