I run Flare 9.x on my MacBook laptop, using VMware Fusion. I just did a minor upgrade of my VMware Fusion to 6.0.6. When I then attempted to start Flare, I was taken to the Activation screen. My license was there, but when I attempted to use it to activate, I received an error message that I've used up my activations for that license.
Does anyone know how I can get my license to work? It's the same VM as previously, but Flare thinks it is a new instance, I guess.
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Scott Marcus | Information Design & Development | Security Analytics
RSA The Security Division of EMC
Upgrading VMware used up my license
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scooter262
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Nita Beck
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Re: Upgrading VMware used up my license
See this thread for instructions: viewtopic.php?f=4&t=21030
Nita
RETIRED, but still fond of all the Flare friends I've made. See you around now and then!
RETIRED, but still fond of all the Flare friends I've made. See you around now and then!
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SteveS
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Re: Upgrading VMware used up my license
You can install and activate Flare on 2 machines, subject to constraints that they are supposed to be on different networks.
Most applications now recognise a VM as a separate machine, so I can see that updating the VM hosting software might create a new logical PC, using up a licence...
Have you an instance of the old VM where you can deactivate Flare? I'm not sure if you can roll back your update to uninstall, before reinstalling the update.
Do you know where the other activation occured? You might be able to deactivate that installation instead.
If it all gets too hard, try contacting customer support, they should be able to reset your activation count...
Most applications now recognise a VM as a separate machine, so I can see that updating the VM hosting software might create a new logical PC, using up a licence...
Have you an instance of the old VM where you can deactivate Flare? I'm not sure if you can roll back your update to uninstall, before reinstalling the update.
Do you know where the other activation occured? You might be able to deactivate that installation instead.
If it all gets too hard, try contacting customer support, they should be able to reset your activation count...
Steve
Life's too short for bad coffee, bad chocolate, and bad red wine.
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doc_guy
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Re: Upgrading VMware used up my license
I've contacted Support several times to get my license activations cleared across various machines. Send them the key that you need cleared, and they can take care of it for you. You'll need to reapply the key in the two instances where you *want* Flare installed. Pretty easy, actually.
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emdeeaitch
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Re: Upgrading VMware used up my license
I have studied this issue quite a bit after losing significant downtime to it, so I would like to add some perspective here that I don't believe is adequately spelled out in the support and sales documentation. As preface, I would like to say that overall I have found Madcap support to be superb, and this has been my one (but significant) sticking point. I am in the position of having inherited an existing Flare installation at a past employer, and am now moving to adopt Flare at a new employer at which I would be the first implementer.
As Steve says above, I believe the core issue is that VMs are subject to logical ID change during various routine events, such as minor software updates or even just occasionally during reboots. With an individual non-floating license, Flare will attempt to use these logical IDs as reliable identifiers, which they absolutely are not. This results in the very frequent exhaustion of your license key and resulting lockout. The "instructions" that Nita links to above are simply to contact support. Given that support is not 24/7, this results in extended downtime, because you lose time contacting support and then lose even more time just waiting for support to open again the next day. Using Fusion on a Mac, I found myself getting locked out sometimes more than once per week in a totally non-floating, single-computer, single-user situation.
When I contacted Madcap support about this recurring issue at my last employer, they said the only real solution was to upgrade me to a "floating" license. Of course this costs a lot more, and it's designed to be used by multiple people, which we aren't. Because this is a deficiency in the design of Madcap's license scheme (some might call it a bug), I refused to pay more. We went back and forth over this for weeks, and finally they agreed to "fix" this on the back end by treating my individual license as a floating license. From my perspective that was exactly the correct fix, except that they put up a gigantic fight before granting it. Today I find myself asking Madcap sales to price the fix into my individual license quote, and they are refusing to provide the same level of service that I had with them previously. I find this frustrating, and it seems that Madcap has created a "have a cake and eat it too" situation for themselves with regard to Mac support.
My position is that if Madcap wants to dangle Mac support in front of us, as they do on their blog, they must either implement a more robust license scheme to avoid unwelcome forced upgrades of individual users or accommodate us as they did me previously. A third path is that they could honestly state this limitation in their blog and Mac-user-directed quotes, but I seriously doubt they would want to choose that option.
Madcap People -- thanks for any pursuit of resolution to this matter. I otherwise enjoy your product, but this issue always strikes at the worse times, and it's not a fair practice in my estimation.
As Steve says above, I believe the core issue is that VMs are subject to logical ID change during various routine events, such as minor software updates or even just occasionally during reboots. With an individual non-floating license, Flare will attempt to use these logical IDs as reliable identifiers, which they absolutely are not. This results in the very frequent exhaustion of your license key and resulting lockout. The "instructions" that Nita links to above are simply to contact support. Given that support is not 24/7, this results in extended downtime, because you lose time contacting support and then lose even more time just waiting for support to open again the next day. Using Fusion on a Mac, I found myself getting locked out sometimes more than once per week in a totally non-floating, single-computer, single-user situation.
When I contacted Madcap support about this recurring issue at my last employer, they said the only real solution was to upgrade me to a "floating" license. Of course this costs a lot more, and it's designed to be used by multiple people, which we aren't. Because this is a deficiency in the design of Madcap's license scheme (some might call it a bug), I refused to pay more. We went back and forth over this for weeks, and finally they agreed to "fix" this on the back end by treating my individual license as a floating license. From my perspective that was exactly the correct fix, except that they put up a gigantic fight before granting it. Today I find myself asking Madcap sales to price the fix into my individual license quote, and they are refusing to provide the same level of service that I had with them previously. I find this frustrating, and it seems that Madcap has created a "have a cake and eat it too" situation for themselves with regard to Mac support.
My position is that if Madcap wants to dangle Mac support in front of us, as they do on their blog, they must either implement a more robust license scheme to avoid unwelcome forced upgrades of individual users or accommodate us as they did me previously. A third path is that they could honestly state this limitation in their blog and Mac-user-directed quotes, but I seriously doubt they would want to choose that option.
Madcap People -- thanks for any pursuit of resolution to this matter. I otherwise enjoy your product, but this issue always strikes at the worse times, and it's not a fair practice in my estimation.