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This Quick Start takes you through a simple example of using License Activation Center (LAC) to learn how to:

  1. Add a product, a license generator and product features.
  2. Create templates for the product.
  3. Add customers.
  4. Create license orders using product templates.
  5. Activate a license.

Adding a product

In this section of the quick start, we'll add a new product to LAC called Flagship, then select the license generator to use for the product. We'll also add features and templates to the product.

To add a product:

  1. Click the Products tab at the top of the License Activation Center web application page.
  2. Under the Menu area, click Create Product. The Create New Product dialog appears.
  3. Enter Flagship for the product's Name. 
  4. Enter 1.0 for the Version. The description is optional. If you like, enter a description, such as "Our primary software product," 
  5. Click Next to add the product to LAC. The License Generator tab is automatically opened.

To add a license generator for the product:

  1. In the License Generator tab, ensure "Add New Generator" is selected for the License Generator and "LM-X" is selected as the Type.
  2. Enter an appropriate name for the license generator; for example, "xmllicgen Windows_x86."
  3. Select the platform for the license generator from the License Generator Platform selection list.
  4. In the Executable field, browse for and select the license generator executable, which for LM-X is xmllicgen.exe).
  5. Note that the Command Line Parameters field shows the command-line parameters that will be used used to call xmllicgen. There is no need to enter data in the Additional Parameters field.
  6. If desired, enter a description for the license generator in the Description field.
  7. Click Next. You automatically proceed to the Features tab. The license generator is uploaded.

To add features to the product:

  1. Under the Menu area in the Features tab, click Create Feature.
  2. Enter F1 for the Feature Name, and 1.0 for the Feature Version.
  3. Click Next to create the feature, and open the Templates tab.
  4. In the Templates tab, click Save without selecting a template. We'll create and use templates later.
  5. Create a second feature called F2 in the same manner as described above.
  6. Click Next from the Features tab to open the Templates tab. We'll create templates in the next section.

Creating templates for the product

Now, we'll create two templates for the product. One template will be for Corporate customers, who will receive 10 network licenses by default, and will have both features F1 and F2 included, with F1 an annual license and F2 a perpetual license. The other template will be for Small Business customers, who will receive one local license by default, will include only feature F1, and will expire 6 months from license activation.

To define a Corporate template for the feature:

  1. Click the Templates tab in the Edit Product "Flagship" dialog.
  2. Under the Menu area, click Create Template. The Add New Template for "Flagship" dialog opens.
  3. In the General tab, enter Corporate for the Template Name, and select:
    1. ETHERNET for HostID Type.
    2. Network for License Type.
    3. Customer for Licensee Type.
  4. Click Next. You proceed to the Features tab.
  5. In the Features tab, select both F1 and F2 as the features to include in a license generated using this template by default. Click Next. The Settings tab opens.
  6. In the Settings tab, specify the following for Feature F1:
    1. Fixed for Expiration Type.
    2. One year from today's date for the Expiration Date. (You can select the date using the calendar or type the date. If typing the date, the format must be YYYY-MM-DD.)
    3. 10 for Network License Count (to indicate that Corporate licenses include 10 seats by default).
  7. For Feature F2, specify:
    1. No Expiration for the Expiration Type.
    2. 1 for the Network License Count.
  8. Click Save to close the dialog.

To define a Small Business template for the feature:

  1. From the Templates tab, edit the Default template.
  2. In the General tab, change the name from "Default" to "Small Business," and specify the following settings:
    1. HOSTNAME for HostID Type.
    2. Local for License Type.
    3. Customer for Licensee Type.
  3. Click Save.
  4. In the Features tab, select only F1. Click Save.
  5. In the Settings tab, specify the following for Feature F1 (this should be the only feature shown in the Settings tab):
    1. Days From Activation for Expiration Type.
    2. 180 (6 months) for Days From Activation.
  6. Click Save to close the dialog.
  7. Close the Edit Product dialog.

Note that both the Corporate and Small Business templates are now available for all features in the product. To assign features to existing templates, you can use the Features tab from the Edit Product dialog. For example, if you open Feature F2 for edit, you will see that it is assigned only to the Corporate template. If you want to also include it in the Small Business template, simply select Small Business from the list of templates to include the feature in.

Adding customers

Now, we'll add a couple of customers to LAC who will be purchasing our Flagship product.

  1. From the main LAC page, click the Customers tab.
  2. Under Menu in the left sidebar, click Create Customer.
  3. Enter ABC Enterprises for Customer Name.
  4. Enter Corporate customer under Notes (optional).
  5. Click Next. The Contacts tab opens.
  6. In the Contacts tab, select Create Contact. The Create New Contact dialog opens.
  7. Enter Joe Biggs for the Contact Name, and jbiggs@abcenterprises.com for Email.
  8. Click Save to create the contact and exit the dialog.

Enter a second customer named "XYZ Ltd" in the same manner as above. This will be our Small Business customer. The only required information for the customer is the customer name; all other information is optional.

Creating license orders

Let's create a license order for our Corporate customer:

  1. From the LAC main page, click the Licenses tab.
  2. Under Menu in the left sidebar, click Create License Order.
  3. In the Add License Order dialog's General tab, select the following:
    1. ABC Enterprises from the Customer selection list.
    2. Flagship from the Product selection list.
    3. Corporate from the Product Template selection list.
    4. To create multiple license orders (generate multiple activation keys), enter 2 or higher in the License Order Count field.
  4. Click Next to accept your choices and open the Settings tab. The Settings tab presents you with the settings that are specified in the template you selected, in this case, the Corporate template.
  5. In order to be able to activate our license later without providing a HostID, change the HostID Type setting to "Not Locked."
  6. Click Save to accept the changes and return to the Licenses tab, where you will now see the order you created for ABC Enterprises added to the top of the License Orders table.
  7. To see the license you've created, click the Edit icon in the Action column for the ABC Enterprises license order, then click the Preview tab in the Edit License Order dialog. From this dialog, you can also make any changes to the license order. For example, using the Settings tab, you could change the template that was used for the order, which will also let you review and edit the template settings.

If you like, create a license order for the Small Business customer in the same way described above, selecting XYZ Ltd as the customer and Small Business as the product template.

Activating a license

To let ABC Enterprises activate their license, you simply copy and paste the Activation Key from the License Orders table into an email with instructions on activating the license.

Let's now assume that you are the end user at ABC Enterprises and want to activate your license.

To activate the license:

  1. Log out of the administrative area of LAC (using the Log Out link in the upper right corner of the page).
  2. Log into LAC by copying and pasting the activation key into the end user login screen at https://license.x-formation.com. (If you're at the vendor login screen, click the "Enter your activation key to get your license" link at the bottom of the login area to switch to the end user login screen.) This opens a Licenses page that list the license details, including the product name, version, license type, and other details. When a host ID is required, this page specifies the host ID type that is needed to activate the license. Since we changed the host ID type to "Not Locked," no host ID type is needed to activate the license.
  3. Click Activate. 
  4. After the license is activated, click Download to get the license. The license is downloaded as a .lic file, can be renamed and placed in an appropriate directory as required to run the licensed software. The license can be re-downloaded anytime, as long as the license is valid (not expired).

This concludes the License Activation Center Administration Quick Start. For complete information about LAC features, including the LAC API, see the License Activation Center Vendor Guide. For more information about activating licenses, see the License Activation Center End User Guide.

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