Associating a license with products

When you add or edit a license, you need to associate the license with one or more software products in order to calculate compliance for product usage and the license. You can select one or more products, including normalized products that represent multiple individual products. If a product is not currently monitored, software license monitoring (SLM) will move the product to the Products>Monitored page when you associate it with a license.

When you select associated products, list the products in the order that you want them to consume the licenses. The first product listed will consume available licenses first. If additional licenses are available, the second product will consume available licenses. This continues down the list until no more licenses are available.

The following is an example of how license calculation is applied with multiple product versions:

  • You have purchased a license for Product ABC that allows 30 installations (or license seats).
  • The license can be used for versions 3, 4, and 5 of that product.
  • In the Associated products list, you have ordered the versions with the most recent version (5) first followed by version 4 and then version 3.

In this situation, the license usage is calculated as follows:

  • 16 users have version 5 installed, so all 16 consume a license seat.
  • 21 users have version 4 installed; 14 of them consume a license seat and 7 are not licensed.
  • 8 users have version 3 installed; none of them are licensed.

Your license compliance reports for this product will show that 15 uses of the product are not covered by the license. You then need to determine whether to purchase additional licenses. You might also review the actual usage of the products in your organization. If some users with the product installed have not used the product for a long period of time, you can check with them to see if they need the software. If not, they can uninstall the product and their licenses can be applied to other users.

NOTE: Licenses are associated with products for compliance calculation. If you delete a product, the license you associated with that product will no longer be associated with it, and compliance reports will no longer show that product as consuming licenses.