[p4] Multiple clients - single user

[David Weintraub]

One of the nice things about Perforce is that they are rather
trustworthy with their licensing issue. For example, Perforce will
give you a set of spare licenses for a backup server.

This allows you to setup a backup server with all Perforce licenses
already installed and waiting. Now, there is nothing stopping you from
giving this backup machine to another department and letting them use
it as their main server. Perforce is basically trusting you on this
issue. Perforce will also give you a free license for integrating into
a defect tracking system -- most other companies will charge for that.

I remember using another revision control system which went down. We
got a backup server, restored our source archive, and then had to wait
a week until we got a new license. The company that sold us the
software first had to make sure that our support was up to date and
that our main server really did go down.

It took three days for this company to decide that our software
support was up to date (which included us having to fax them a copy of
the check as proof of payment. And, it took another 3 days to convince
them that our system did crash, and we weren't attempting to get free
licenses.

It is nice to have a company that actually trusts its customers.

On 6/15/07, Greg Whitfield <Greg.Whitfield at lightworkdesign.com> wrote:
> I'm sure nobody was accusing you of piracy.
>
> But on per-user vs per-client, I think making per "real person" is
> absolutely the right model for licenses.
>
> If I want to create a new client space to handle different development
> branch, or perhaps documentation or management information, I would not
> want to be charged for that. Or have my workflow interrupted by having
> to go through the purchasing cycle.
>
> I would also end up getting charged every time I added a new build
> machine to my network.
>
> Clients are about being able to organise your data in a way that suits
> your own working practices. If Perforce put up a cost barrier to prevent
> you organising things that streamline your own activities I think it
> would lose a great deal of its power and flexibility. I probably would
> not have recommended purchasing it either.
>
> Just my 10c worth.
>
> Greg
> ~~~~
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Didster [mailto:didster at gmail.com]
> Sent: 15 June 2007 11:11
> To: Greg Whitfield
> Cc: Robert Cowham; paul goffin; perforce-user at perforce.com
> Subject: Re: [p4] Multiple clients - single user
>
> Hi Guys,
>
> Thanks very much for all your responses.
>
> Just to be clear, my query was out of curiosity more than anything - we
> have already purchased a licence for 9 users which covers our current 4
> perm staff + any temps + a bit of expansion.
>
> At our company, we have been forced to use a product called Accurev for
> the last 3 years for source control [it's truly dreadful] and the cost
> of 9 user licences for perforce was worth every penny.
>
> But...  Not every "company" in the world takes software theft seriously
> - and it just seemed to me that it's a strange decision to make the
> license based on per-user rather than per-client when sharing a user
> technically is possible and presents no problems from a functional point
> of view - hence my question.
>
> Thanks
>
>
> On 6/15/07, Greg Whitfield <Greg.Whitfield at lightworkdesign.com> wrote:
> >
> >
> > >I loved the story of a vendor whose product was secured by a dongle
> > read at
> > >start up. After a support conversation they realised that a certain
> > customer
> > >was using the same license multiple times. It eventually turned out
> > that one
> > >chap at the customer had the job of cycling round between branch
> > offices with
> > >said dongle every morning, getting the software running on various
> > machines!
> >
> > Can't have been my software then - many moons ago when I wrote the
> > dongle checker for a program, it kept checking at random intervals,
> > and would not allow things like file-save's without a dongle.
> >
> > Still, a job title of "Dongle Cycler" has a certain ring to it :)
> >
> >
> >
>
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-- 
--
David Weintraub
qazwart at gmail.com