Citrix Systems promised delegates at its user conference in the US
last week that it would simplify its licensing policies.
Chief executive officer Mark Templeton told the Citrix iForum that
the software maker was working on a technology-based approach to
help customers count and manage licence connections through a
service that either Citrix or the customer could run.
Citrix's core product, MetaFrame XP, delivers applications to end
users from a central server. Customers buy licence connections
through resellers based on the number of concurrent users accessing
the server.
Licensing services will be built into Citrix's software, allowing
customers and the vendor "to count usage in about five different
ways", Templeton said. That will give both parties "the flexibility
to have licensing programs built around different ways of
counting", he added.
Templeton added that he expected to present the new options to
customers in about a year's time.
For many of them, that promises welcome relief. Tony Silva, a
vice-president of IT ABN Amro North America, said it has been
somewhat complicated to keep track not only of the Citrix licences
but the other software applications running on the Citrix servers
as well.
Jim McGrath, a senior manager of product and technical marketing at
Citrix, said the difficulties could be particularly frustrating for
long-time customers that may have gone through several different
licensing programs and discount structures.
Citrix has started to address the problems. The company launched an
electronic licensing option in March 1999, and this August it
introduced an Easy Licensing program that lets customers buy
products, as they need them without a formal, written
contract.
Using the Easy Licensing option, customers can consolidate multiple
licence contracts to a single serial number, so they don't have to
enter their many 20-digit numbers manually, McGrath said.
But McGrath said it would be better if the information from
Citrix's product activation system was uploaded to its secure
licence site so customers could see what they had purchased, when
they bought it and how much of their Subscription Advantage option
was left on each of their licences.
From May, new Citrix licences had to be purchased with a one-year
subscription that entitled customers to any new product updates
released over that period.
Templeton said customers could be adding licences on a monthly
basis, and each time they do, they get another licence number that
must be added into the system for activation purposes. This was, he
admitted, "too complicated".
Alvin Park, an analyst at Gartner, said many vendors are
considering new tools to not only help customers track their
licenses but also to keep them in compliance.