arivis Licensing: Local, Floating, Soft & Hard Keys

Introduction

arivis software uses a licensing system provided by a third party to restrict and protect the use of the software and its distribution.

The license dictates:

Aside from what modules are included, the main distinction in license types is between Local/ Vs Floating and Soft Vs Hard keys

Soft vs Hard Licenses

Soft licenses are linked to a specific computer. This is the default configuration. The license is configured at the time of installation by use of an activation key, which, once activated, locks the license to a specific machine.
Hard licenses are attached to a hardware dongle.

Task	Soft Key	Hard Key
Activation	Activation key entered by user on destination machine	Configured prior to shipping, no activation required
Transfer	Requires de-activation from initial PC then re-activation on destination PC	Unplug USB key from initial PC, plug it in to the destination PC
Upgrade/Update	Managed through license tool	Managed through license tool
Conversion between floating/local	Done in software through license tool	Requires new USB key

Local licenses can only be used on the computer that the license is physically attached to. This includes RDP and VMs where the end user's computer essentially acts as an access point to the machine that does the processing and holds the license.
Floating licenses are attached to a "License server" which distributes out the license to other computers on the same network. The license server need not run the software at all and just needs to be able to run the license utility and be on the same network as the clients (whether it is the same physical network or a VPN).