The KEYTYPE directive specifies whether a network license is exclusive, additive or token-based.
By default, all network licenses are exclusive. If two exclusive licenses of the same feature name are present, the first is used and the second is discarded. Additive licenses can coexist with exclusive licenses and other additive network licenses of the same feature name.
This directive can be used only with network licenses; accordingly, the COUNT directive or TOKEN_DEPENDENCY directive must be set if KEYTYPE is set. The KEYTYPE = TOKEN directive must be used together with the TOKEN_DEPENDENCY directive. Token-based licenses are always additive. (See Token-based licensing for more information about how to define a token-based license.)
Usage and recommendations
Adding licenses for software features that a customer buys later than the initial purchase of a license can be easily accomplished by using multiple additive licenses, which don’t require that you change the original license. To prepare an additive license, you need to create a feature with the same name as the original license, set the proper version and count numbers, and add the line <SETTING KEYTYPE=”ADDITIVE”> to the XML license template file.
By default, all network licenses are exclusive, which means that they are taken into account first. During checkout, additive licenses are seen as a separate license pool of the same feature. You should ensure all needed features are checked out at one time, because a client cannot check out licenses from two different license pools.
It is important to understand that multiple additive licenses (even when combined with an exclusive license) do not behave exactly the same as one license with the combined license count.
If a client tries to acquire multiple licenses, the maximum number of licenses that can be acquired will be equal to what one feature holds. The license server will not perform checkouts across multiple licenses.
For example: One exclusive and two additive licenses of feature "ABC" are available on a license server with the license counts 1, 2 and 3. If a client tries to acquire one "ABC" license, the first feature with count 1 will be used. If this same client later attempts to acquire another "ABC" license, there will not be enough licenses for the first feature; thus, the client will be denied. However, if another client requests one or two licenses, the checkout will succeed, because it will take a license from the other license pool.
To minimize problems, you should checkout all needed licenses at one time.