FootPrints supports
both fixed and concurrent (floating) licenses for Agents. A fixed
license allows one named user to log into FootPrints with a specific
ID and password. A concurrent license can be used by an unlimited
number of people, but only one can use a particular concurrent license
instance at a time. Each user sharing a concurrent license has their
own unique ID and password, but can only log in if a concurrent license
is free.
To make this clearer, if five concurrent licenses are
purchased and thirty people are sharing those licenses, only five users
can be logged in at one time. When a sixth user tries to log in,
the sixth user receives a message stating that there are no available
licenses. When one of the five logged in users finally logs out
of FootPrints, a license is freed.
This type of license is useful for casual users of FootPrints
or users working opposing shifts. This license is not appropriate for
users who require access to FootPrints at all times. As the
concurrent license costs approximately 2.5 times as much as a fixed license,
at least three users must share a concurrent license to make it cost-effective.
Other aspects of the concurrent licensing:
Can be purchased
by contacting your BMC sales representative.
A site can contain
mixed fixed and concurrent licenses.
While an unlimited
number of concurrent licenses can be purchased, at least three fixed Agent
licenses must also be purchased (i.e., the FootPrints Starter Pack).
This allows at least three users (including at least one System Administrator)
to have access to FootPrints at
all times.
Concurrent licenses
can be used by Agents and Workspace Administrators, including users assigned
custom roles. They cannot be used by System Administrators, who
must use fixed licenses.
The Customer license
is not affected by concurrent licenses. The unlimited Customer license
continues to be appropriate for employee and external customers who need
limited access to FootPrints (to submit and track their own issues
and to search the Knowledge Base).
Once you are licensed
for concurrent users, the choice to make an Agent or Workspace Administrator
a concurrent or fixed user is available on the Add
Agent and Edit
Agent pages. You can only make as many fixed users as the
number of fixed licenses available. An unlimited number of concurrent
users can be created.
Concurrent Agent
and Workspace Administrators can be members of multiple Workspaces and are
identical to fixed users in all other ways (with the exception of accessing
FootPrints based on there being an available license).
Concurrent users
should be encouraged to log out and free licenses
for other users.
When a concurrent
user closes the browser without logging out of FootPrints, the
license is freed within fifteen minutes.
When a concurrent
user remains logged into FootPrints, but does not perform any actions,
the license is freed within one hour.
If all licenses are
being used and the System Administrator needs to free up licenses, a Reset
License Manager function is available under Administration
| System | License. If this function is used, all Agents
and other Administrators (fixed and concurrent) in the system are logged
out immediately. The System Administrator performing the action
and customers are not affected. This feature should only be used
when necessary, as users may lose their work.
For customers who
switch from fixed licenses to a smaller number of concurrent licenses,
all Agents are changed automatically to concurrent users when the new
license is installed. You can manually update any additional Agent
or administrator users to match the correct number of fixed licenses purchased
on the Edit
Agent screen.
Note
A system log is kept to record each time a concurrent user
attempts to log in to FootPrints and is denied because no concurrent
licenses are available. This log can be viewed on the FootPrints server
by reading the file c:\FootprintsServiceCore\etc\debugging\loginErrors.txt.