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The Premier Software Usage Analysisand Reporting Toolset

Maximizing Value for Software Users

Your partner in Software Asset Management

Motivation

Understanding how your software assetsare utilized is critical …

… even more so now that the software industryis moving to “Software as a Service”.


Solution – License Tracker

License Tracker not only enables optimization of your current assets …

…but it also facilitates software vendors and users to enter into next generation software licensing models.


The License Tracker toolset is:– a suite of Java programs and utilities, that– enable enterprises to analyze software usage data generated by other systems,

in order to– understand how those software assets are being used, and– to optimize the use and management of those assets.

What is the License Tracker Toolset


Business Issues Addressed by License Tracker

• Capacity Planning– adjust appropriately to corporate

acquisitions or divestitures– proactively adjust license counts for

changes in usage patterns

• Business Unit Cost Splitting– base charge backs on usage metrics

• Ensuring Proper License Usage– determine if unlicensed users are

accessing software– detect license abuse (checkouts

without checkins)

• Optimization of Current License Counts

– under provisioned : denials are impacting productivity

– over provisioned : licenses may never be used

• Access to Software(facilitating new licensing models)

– pay-per-use for peak periods– product family remixing and other

partnerships with strategic vendors


LicenseTrackerInteractive Reports

WebTrackerLinked Reports

Users

1. Generate Usage Data - Application usage data is collected by concurrent use license managers, desktop management systems, remote access servers and other systems and is stored in either logfiles or databases.

2. Process Usage Data - License Tracker imports the usage data by reading the logfiles or interacting with the database systems and creates its own session database. User details, entitlement and other financial information is also imported to the database.

3. Analyze Usage Data - The usage analyst can then use either License Tracker to view interactive reports, or Web Tracker to create a suite of reports for web viewing.

UserModel

LicenseModel

SessionDatabase

BudgetModel

How does License Tracker Work?

Logfiles

Databases


Components of the License Tracker Toolset

The License Tracker toolset consists of:

– License Tracker creates a database from externally generated usage data and interactively creates charts and reports to enable understanding of the data“Generating the understanding”

– Web Tracker creates all of the commonly used reports and charts from a License Tracker database in an easy to navigate web format“Sharing the understanding”

– Auto Tracker enables you to schedule License Tracker database creation and Web Tracker report generation in an automated, non-GUI manner“Automating the understanding”


• License Tracker provides the widest array of charts and reports that let you clearly see how many copies of which software products have been used at all times, and who used them.

Capacity Planning, Optimization and Usage Validation


Capacity Planning, Optimization and Usage Validation - 2

• all of License Tracker’s charts and reports can be exported for inclusion in documents or further analysis in a spreadsheet


Capacity Planning, Optimization and Usage Validation - 3

• the content of License Tracker’s charts and reports can be refined by using the filter

– select specific users and hosts

– reduce date ranges


• User Model lets you associate full names and departments with each userID.

• License-Group report provides a breakdown of each department’s total use of each license.

• Business Unit cost split report shows the percentage of “usage” for each department.

Business Unit Cost Splitting and Analysis


• License Model lets your software vendors specify copies owned, purchase price, rental prices (yearly, monthly and hourly) as well as rental model.

• Invoice report provides a breakdown of instances that non-owned copies were used, the cost for each period and the total amount owing.

Access to Software : Pay-Per-Use


• Budget Model lets you specify your budgeted rental expenditures on a monthly basis

• PPU Summary chart provides a breakdown of monthly and cumulative actual costs, allowing you to compare them to budget.

Access to Software : Pay-Per-Use Cost Monitoring


• License Efficiency report lets you see:

– which features you have under used (paid too much in maintenance), and

– which features you have over used (paid too much in rentals or had the most denials).

• This information allows you to make appropriate “remix” choices.

Access to Software : Remix


• Web Tracker enables a usage analyst to prepare the most commonly used License Tracker reports with a single request.

• Reports are generated for each licensed feature, each user and each group defined in the User Model as well as key analyses.

• Cross linked reports makes understanding usage patterns very intuitive.

Web Tracker - Sharing the Understanding


Web Tracker - Selecting Report Set Contents

• a simple selection dialog allows specification of which reports, as well as which components of each report, are to be generated in any Web Tracker set


Understanding how your software assets are utilized is critical …

… but obtaining and processing usage data can place a strain on limited IT resources …

… regular monitoring to detect problems in a timely manner can exacerbate the situation …

… and distributing usage reports can place an even further burden!

The Need for Automation


Solution – Auto Tracker

Auto Tracker not only provides the full usage analysis and reporting capabilities of License Tracker …

… as well as the easy to browse usage reports of Web Tracker …

… but it does so in an automated manner requiring minimal effort from IT resources.


• AutoLoader– load usage data, user information or entitlement information

• AutoReporter– update Web Tracker pages for various projects

• AutoAlerter– email alerts on detection of specified situations

Execution of individual components is controlled in batch schedulable scripts.

Auto Tracker Components


Different Editions for Different Requirements

• all sizes of organizations use software• therefore the requirements on a usage analysis system can vary dramatically• the License Tracker toolset is available in two editions to meet these different

needs– File Database edition

• based on MS-Access• suitable for organization with usage levels on the order of 1,000s to low

100,000s of sessions– Server Database edition

• based on either MySQL or Oracle• suitable for organizations with usage levels ranging from high 100,000s to

100,000,000s of sessions• enterprises can scale database server capabilities to adapt to data storage

and access requirements


Enabling Global Enterprise Analysis

• License Tracker’s centralized database enables you to effectively manage and analyze your global data

– import data from all your global license servers (regardless of license manager technology) to a single database

– provide different views into the database using “Content Scopes”– conduct different financial analyses on the same data with different “License

Models”

“You can only optimize -what you understand…

…and you can only understand -what you track!”

www.licensetracker.ca

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