CAL license analysis questions

[JacobsAunt]

Our system is at a point where we are exceeding our CAL licenses on a regular basis (daily). I have tried a number of things to resolve this, such as converting some CAL users to named users and vice versa, but this is not easing the problem. We are at a point where we are considering purchasing additional CAL licenses. The problem with this is that I need to be able to do some analysis before new licenses are purchased. I have some questions and have been unable to find the answers on Crystal's site.

We are using CE 8.5 Pro with the ePortfolio application as the interface. We only have 10 named licenses, so the majority of our users are CAL users.

1. How can I determine who is logged in at a given point?
2. How can I tell how long an individual has been logged in?
3. How can I get statistics for overall license usage? (For each day, when and how often did we reach the max CAL license usage?)
4. Can CAL users be prioritized? (By individual or Group)
5. Can connections be terminated remotely to free licenses?
6. How can I limit the number of licenses (separate login sessions on a single or multiple workstations) used by each CAL user?

Thank you for any insight you can give me
K Tanner

HTTP://www.sento.com

 

[synapsevampire]

Some of these questions can be resolved by modifying and checking the log, it can demonstrate IP addresses and reports viewed.

CMC->Servers->WCS

Check the Administrators guide:

http://<yourserver>/crystal/enterprise/help/en/administration/html/default.htm

Also the server metrics in the sample administrators guide might help.

There's also 3rd party products, such as APOS:

http://support.crystaldecisions.com/library/kbase/articles/c2012056.asp

-k

http://www.informeddatadecisions.com

kai@informeddatadecisions.com

 

[JacobsAunt]

Thank you for this lead. I am less concerned at this point with what is happening with the reports than I am with looking a license usage overall. I have looked through the administrator's guide several times, but it does not give me the information I am looking for.

In short, report usage is not as concerning to me as is user behavior and license activity.

K Tanner

 

[synapsevampire]

The logging should help towards that end, I read it into a table and joined the IP's to the users and provided a reasonable peek into CE usage.

If you're using IIS, it also has a log which might help, and there are lots of 3rd party tools, such as:

http://www.winappslist.com/network-admin/log_analyzers.htm

-k

http://www.informeddatadecisions.com

kai@informeddatadecisions.com

 

[JacobsAunt]

Please forgive me for being slow, but here is my concern/question with the IP logging.

We have users that each have access to multiple workstations. In addition, the users are literally scattered over the globe and at a number of different companies. Tracking individual user information by IP address in this scenario becomes very prohibitive. do you have any knowledge of other 3rd party solutions that can assist me?

We are using an apache server for our web interface that allows access through secure certificates. Does this add a wrinkle to your suggestions?

K Tanner

 

[GPOGA]

From what I see here, I have to say, in short that there is no straight forward way to access these kinds of metrics without some custom programming or third party apps. If you have a transaction logging software (WebTrends) you will be able to track general site usage, users, time spent per page, pages viewed, etc. This might help with usage stats. As far as limiting the number of logons, we have had to implement session timeouts. If their session times out, they are no longer using up a license. They have to log back in to view any more reports. This eliminates the users who open up a browser to view a report and then go to lunch without logging out.

Hope that gives you a little more insight.

 

[ImNotTheKing]

FYI: If you have a programmer on staff, it is a simple matter to write an application or service which will periodically query Crystal's database and be able to log / report on session activity. I wrote such a service for us which polls every 30 seconds and generates a log of who has used the system. Then, I created a report which graphs out session activity vs. time to demonstrate what our CAL usage pattern is. This information is of great value in determining when we need more licenses.