Hi All,
Apologies if this has been covered elsewhere. I've had an exhaustive look/read/refresher with all the TS licensing posts but only found one mention of AppSense amongst them.
At the moment, we are looking at a software solution that will allow us to manage our MS Office licenses across our TS environment, so that we comply with the MS Licensing Agreement.
We had an AppSense rep run through a demo with us, but I would like to find out if there are any other alternatives out there? Can anyone recommend something? Or share your experiences? So far, I have found the following items to review and evaluate:
Ideally, I would love a product that did everything I need it to (short of making me an espresso)...but some of the features I need are:
A few suggestions would be greatly appreciated so I can add them to my evaluation list!
Thanks so much :)
Hi All
Just to put this one to bed, Office is licensed Per Device, its always been Per Device, never Per User, the confusion arises due to CALs, both Windows and TS being available either Per User or Per Device
Check out my blog entry on Licensing Office in a TS or Citrix environment for more info
http://ladylicensing.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!87F95F1B5B21B01E!211.entry
Bottom line, every device connecting to the TS, accessing, displaying, installing, copying, using or otherwise interacting with Office requires an Office license to be assigned
We may ask you to demonstrate that you have adequate Office licenses for every device, locking down by User Profiles will not suffice, as that "user" could still technically go to any device, if you can demonstrate to us that a device has never used office, by locking down that device, this would be sufficient to exclude you requiring an Office license for those specific devices
Hope this helpsEmma
Are your users on your local LAN or accessing remotely? If your LAN users have office installed and licensed on the client pc, you do not need additional office licenses for those users, since they are already covered on the workstation.
Hi Dan,
My users are spread across a WAN but yes, essentially all are local users. They use WYSE thin clients. I want some form of control (software as mentioned above) to ensure that I know which WYSE terminals are licensed for Office and which aren't. Do you know what I mean? I'm not worried about my PC users - only my TS users.
Thanks
Belle
Just to add further:
- How do other company's license their Office per device in a TS environment? We were going to limit it via the WNOS.ini file that deploys to each of our thin clients. Is there another way? A simpler way?
- Also - if there is some software out that that JUST manages licenses per device - I would love to know if it exists :)
Thanks and sorry for so much information!
I don't know of any software to manage Office Licenses on T/S. If you have a number of Office Licenses purchased, you should be able to keep track of the numbers across T/S.
Err thanks but thats not really helpful.....
Appsense is pretty much the only software that manages the licenses from what I can tell, but of course its Microsoft Certified so I want to look at other alternatives.
I know how many licenses we have because we restrict it per user (through folder redirects and group policies) but since Microsoft have changed the licensing scheme in that it has to be done "per device", we now have to change our methods to make sure we comply.
The MS licensing states that you must tie down the Office license per device rather than per user - so how do other companies do this? Or dont they know about this yet?
I think MS System Center does most of the stuff you need, but are you adverse to Microsoft Certified products
--Emil
Thanks for that Emil - I'm not adverse - I just think that there are always alternatives to the MS monopoly. :)
I had this discussion with a bloke that is really in depth conserning licensing. It doesn't matter if you use Appsense or Powerfuse2008 or what ever program to restrict the licenses you have to the number of users who can use them. Officially you have to have as much licenses as users can logon to your terminal servers(that is the official way). Microsoft looks simply the otherway if you are compliant with all your other licenses and have software like appsense or powerfuse2008 to restrict your environment. If a salesperson from Microsoft has to get his/her target however your screwed. That were the words I got to hear. There is no official quote from Microsoft that states if you use appsense or powerfuse or what ever program you comply to our licensing program. Very strange but shamefully its the way we have to work in terminal server environments. I always recommended powerfuse as the way to comply to MS licensing terms but never knew it was a bit pointless :(
Hans Straat , The NetherlandsCEO www.datacrash.net
Thanks for the reply Hans :) - im a bit surprised more people haven't offered advice. MS licensing always seems to be a bone of contention amongst us super-geeks. :/
Terminal Services and Citrix Presentation Server user logging www.terminalserviceslog.com
Thanks Emma.
I meant to reply on this sooner.
We are going to lock it down via thin client using the mac address of the physical device.
Thanks so much - your answer definately helped!