FORUMula1.com - F1 Forum

[headless]

In a big company, schools aswell, they obviously have a network.
They have software installed on all PC's aswell.
The software can't be installed on each one, or the product key would become used to the full.
So what do they have instead of this average key that normal customers get?
What is teh kind of useage of it?

[What's Burning?]

At least Microsoft has "enterprise" grade keys that allow for ghosted images to be replicated.

[Denthúl]

If it's going to go on every computer, you can get a site licence. This is one serial key that covers you for either your entire site, or an agreed number of computers on the site (I'm not talking a small, 50-user licence but perhaps 500-1000 and even more). When it comes to software that you want to use in specific areas, it can get a little more tricky, but usually if you specifically buy a multi-user licence you get one key that covers you. If you buy 50 single-user licences, you can in most cases get by just using one key as long as, should a particular organisation come to inspect you, you can provide enough licence keys for the number of installations.

I don't actually know what happens when it comes to software that activates itself online to check if the key is a duplicate as I've never installed anything like that where I work, but I imagine there are (legitimate) ways around it.

[headless]

What if an external personal person got hold of a key?
Can they use it?

[Denthúl]

Yes.

What happens then depends on what kind of key it is. If a company finds out that you're using an organisation's registered serial key (Microsoft give a specific VLK to every organisation that pays for a licensing agreement) then they can take action, but if it's just a regular key with no record of it being assigned to a specific organisation, then that key may just end up being disabled and both parties can no longer use it. Of course, only one of the two loses out :/

[headless]

hmm I see
how d'you know all this?

[What's Burning?]

I would think Microsoft would have no beef unless the license is exceeding the amount of machines that it covers. Use is different than abuse. It's not a big deal if an end user gets a enterprise key for Office 2007 and installes it on 3 or 4 machines. It is a big deal when a pirate gets it and distributes that key amongst 10,000 pirated CD's for sale in the black market.

[headless]

aye

[Denthúl]

hmm I see
how d'you know all this?

Network admin in a school.

[headless]

hmm I see
how d'you know all this?

Network admin in a school.

What would you do if a savvy kid got hold of a key and installed it at home then!?

[Denthúl]

hmm I see
how d'you know all this?

Network admin in a school.

What would you do if a savvy kid got hold of a key and installed it at home then!?

I don't know. Our security is so tight that we've never had that problem. All the keys are stored very securely

[What's Burning?]

I managed a desktops support team in a previous century! So when the whole ideal of support teams being able to use programs like Ghost to not have to build a PC from scratch and install all of the required software, it save hours of work every time a hard drive died.

As far as your what would happen question... If you use it and don't abuse it, likely nothing will happen. it's likely no one will know unless the site license exceeds the amount of machines covered. Enterprise licenses can cover thousands or hundreds of thousands of machines.

[headless]

Hmm is very interesting stuff
anyone use Freenet?

[Denthúl]

it's likely no one will know unless the site license exceeds the amount of machines covered. Enterprise licenses can cover thousands or hundreds of thousands of machines.

Given my experience of a current situation at work, it's actually likely that nothing would happen even if you were way over the limit*

Hmm is very interesting stuff
anyone use Freenet?

What's Freenet?

* Please note that I do not approve of said situation, but it's out of my hands now.

[headless]

Google it
The Freenet Project
The dark side of the internet.
I aint too familiar at all, but everything is anonymous and stored elsewhere.
have a read into it, better than my explanation.