Software licensing: hints on staying legit

Stephen Withers
Tuesday, 25 August 2009 09:23

IT Industry - Development

Step two is to develop in-house licensing expertise. Software licences aren't simple - the number of licences you need may vary according to the options you activate and who the users are.

Building that expertise typically calls for training, which is available from specialist firms (such as iComply) as well as some resellers.

Parker suggests that one way of working around a lack of internal expertise in this area is to avoid going to a vendor with a shopping list such as five licences for product X, and instead explaining how you propose to deploy the software so the vendor can tell you the number of licences required.

(You might want the vendor to explain the answer so you can check it against the licence terms, but this is one way of developing your own expertise.)

For example, Parker has seen examples of organisations that have adopted server virtualisation but haven't understood the implications as far as software licensing is concerned.

Another situation is that activating Outlook Web Services may require the purchase of client access licences (CALs).

"The people who are responsible for software licence compliance [often] aren't trained," he observes. Engaging a trusted advisor can help get things started.

For Microsoft customers, Parker recommends Volume Licensing Briefs as "an invaluable source of information," and Product Licensing Web as a one-stop source for volume licensing terms and conditions.

The three-step licence-management program concludes on page 3.