Software License Management – X-Formation

We’re happy to announce the release of License Statistics v4.0!

This major release implements a number of new features that make the software more scalable and enterprise-ready:

1. 64-bit MySQL server (for 64-bit Windows or Linux versions only). We’ve embedded a 64-bit MySQL server with License Statistics, which improves speed for larger environments. This can consume up to 12GB of memory, but allows for faster queries that speed up the entire web-based UI. Furthermore, we’ve updated the embedded MySQL database from 5.1 to 5.5, which is up to 300% faster in some cases (according to MySQL documentation and our own testing).
2. Added HTTPS support. We now support HTTP over SSL using Apache.
3. Added support for Felics license manager (import only).
4. Dropped all support for SQLite and the related command-line tools, xfeditdb and xfcustomreport.
5. Introduced a new command-line report tool, licstatreport, which lets you download existing reports from a command line. Using this tool, System Administrators can automate downloads of existing data from the database and schedule reporting on demand.

In addition to these new features, we’ve made many smaller parser changes to improve error message consistency and clarity.

Furthermore, this release completely removes the concurrent user licensing that has been used for all prior versions of License Statistics. Customers with older licenses won’t be able to use this new version until you update your license, as explained in the notification we sent to our affected customers in December.

For complete release notes for License Statistics v4.0, please see:
http://kb.x-formation.com/questions/310/License+Statistics+v4.0+Release+Notes

As always, the improvements we’ve made in this release were done in response to customer input. What can we do better for you? Please be sure to contribute your thoughts and suggestions to help us continue improving License Statistics in ways that make a difference for you. We are always eager to get your feedback, so get in touch at +1 406 322 2614  or support@X-Formation.com.

Due to an electrical maintenance in our office building that will be conducted over the weekend, many of our services such as online documentation or support portal will not be available. The services will be down as of Friday (January 20) approx. 7:00 pm GMT+1 until Monday (January 23) morning, approx. 9:00 am GMT+1. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. Should you have any questions or concerns, please contact us at +1 406 322 2614  or support@X-Formation.com. Thank you.

The LM-X License Server GUI is a relatively new development that came out in September with LM-X v4.0, but has already improved by leaps and bounds. Through our constant cooperation with customers we’ve implemented a number of new features that provide software end users with more power and flexibility.

Until now the web-based UI allowed end users to:

• View information and statistics about the LM-X license server
• Restart or shut down the license server
• View the LM-X server’s HostIDs, such as Ethernet, Hostname, IP Address, etc
• View license usage statistics for the current license server, as well as for borrow, grace and trial licenses
• View and edit the configuration file
• View and search for entries in the log file

With the recent development, however, users can now also:

• Activate licenses and upload license files
• Enable and configure High Availability Licensing (HAL)
• Enable and configure Pay Per Use
• Enable and configure license server logging
• Configure settings for TCP, remote access and user removal

For each of these new administrative functions we created sub-tabs with a user interface for easy access and modification of settings.

License Management tab

In the License Management tab users can can activate and download licenses from License Activation Center (LAC). Users can also upload license files, for example, licenses that a vendor has provided via email or a license that was previously activated and needs to be uploaded to the server.

High Availability Licensing (HAL) tab

Through the High Availability Licensing tab, High Availability Licensing can be enabled, which allows users to configure backup (redundant) license servers that will continue to serve licenses should the master server go down.

Pay Per Use tab

In the Pay Per Use tab, users can enable and configure pay per use, which, as an example, would allow them to use an unrestricted usage license that would be paid for based on actual usage.

Logging tab

Under the Logging tab, users can enable and configure logging to produce a log file that contains detailed activity such as client connections or disconnections, license checkout/checkin, and other server activity. Users can specify the name for the log file, the format of the file (Normal or Extended), the rotation interval (None, Daily, Weekly or Monthly), and any LM-X messages to exclude from logging.

Miscellaneous tab

In the Miscellaneous tab users can specify the TCP port number the license server will listen on, set a remote administration password (used when remotely stopping and restarting the license server and removing users from it), and also specify the minimum time that must elapse before a user can be removed.

We look forward to your feedback as to make further enhancements in the LM-X License Server GUI to better meet your license management needs, so give us a call.

Download a free evaluation of LM-X License Manager.