Single-Use Desktop / Engine Licensing in the Cloud

792
3
03-26-2018 06:13 AM
Status: Open
JonathanBailey
Occasional Contributor III

Currently, there's not a convenient way to license Desktop or Engine with a single-use license in the cloud (e.g., Azure VMs, Amazon WorkSpaces). The user has to de-authorize before shutting down the cloud VM, otherwise, the single-use license enters an "untrusted" state (because the hardware IDs change when the machine is restarted).

This is vitally important for small organizations who use cloud services as part of their DevOps. For example, in order for a third-party solution to support multiple releases of ArcGIS Desktop, the implementer will want to build and run unit tests against each release. The choices to do this are:

  1. a separate physical machine for each release;
  2. a separate VM for each release running on a local server; or
  3. a separate cloud VM for each release.

The most cost-efficient option will usually be #3, and the automation tools available on cloud platforms can be used to automate build, test, and deploy.

However, the lack of a single-use licensing solution for the cloud for developers essentially precludes #3 as an option.

3 Comments
KoryKramer

Have you looked into setting up a license manager with concurrent use licenses as recommended here: FAQ: What is the best licensing method to use for virtual machine deployment of ArcGIS 10 Desktop or... 

JonathanBailey

Hi Kory,

This model doesn't work for developers, who get single-use licenses with an ArcGIS for Developers subscription.

Thanks,

Jon.

KoryKramer

Thanks for the additional context!