3.12. Keeping Each User to the correct license

Enterprise Network

An Enterprise Network client gets its license at install time, or in a specific activation step. That license stays with that computer, whether or not the Palisade software is running, unless the license is deactivated through License Manager in the software. (This would be done before the computer is wiped or decommissioned, for example.)

When you download an Enterprise Network license from Palisade’s server to your server, Server Manager prompts you to create a separate Palisade_NetworkClient.ini file for each Enterprise Network Activation ID. Then, when you install an Enterprise Network client, you simply use the Palisade_NetworkClient.ini file for the product and edition that you want that user to have.

Concurrent Network

A Concurrent Network client gets a license dynamically from your server at run time. When the end user closes Excel, or unloads the Palisade software, the license is released.

The software has default rules about which license is used, but the end user can always click Select License in License Manager to get a list of available licenses. The list includes every relevant license that exists on one or more of the listed servers and has a seat available; it excludes licenses that this user or computer is not authorized to use. After the user chooses one, the software remembers the selection and tries to use the same license the next time that user runs. (Which License Gets Used? tells much more about this.)

For example, if all @RISK Industrial licenses are in use, but the user doesn’t need to run any optimizations or fit time series, an @RISK Professional license (if available) would be perfectly usable. A user who usually uses @RISK Professional, but needs to run a one-time optimization, could click Select License and select an Industrial license, if one is available.

If you want to restrict certain users to certain licenses, there are two methods to enforce this:

• Use INCLUDE, EXCLUDE, and similar lines in your options file. See Access Control in Concurrent Network.
  
  
• Put different licenses on different servers, then connect each user to the appropriate server via the Palisade_NetworkClient.ini file at client install time. You can later grant access to a different product or an additional product by updating that client’s server connection, if you wish; see How do I change port numbers or server names on existing Concurrent Network clients?

If you have multiple Activation IDs for the same product and edition, the network software treats the total of those concurrencies as a single pool. Usually this is a good thing, but if you need to make sure that certain people or groups always have a license available, you can use the RESERVE keyword in the options file. See More Options for On-Network Use.