© Copyright Robert Vasvari, 2005-2009.

Licensing AASync

If you want to use the advanced features AASync, such as Local-to-Remote or Remote-To-Local sync, you need to license the program. Licenses may be obtained from www.aasync.com. Once you have a license key, enter it into the License Registry Panel. Without a license, AASync functions as a free sync engine that does sync operations on folder pairs that reside on local (and locally mounted external disks). In this case, the advanced functions are disabled. AASync will detect licenses at startup only!

Click on the Help/License Registry menu to bring up the License Registry Panel:

License Search Directories:
When AASync starts up, it looks for licenses in the folders defined in this section. It must find one, otherwise only the basic FTP functionality will work. AASync supplies the defaults (~/Library/Licenses, /Local/Licenses) to search. For most users these will do just fine. For networked installations there may be licenses in other shared directories. Click on the "Add" button to add more folders to search. To restore the factory default search list, click "Reset".

If you want to define these directories as a global default for all of your users, you can edit the RBReadLicenseDirs entry in the GlobalPrefs.xml file in the app wrapper.

Licenses in Use:
This section will show all users currently using AASync on the local LAN. Use this screen to see who is using the available licenses on your local network.

Found Licenses:
Shows all available valid licenses found by AASync by searching the folders listed above. One of these will be used to launch AASync.

Host Id:
The Host Id is unique for each computer. The Host Id is used for hostbound licenses. For full description of the different license types visit the Licensing Terms page.

License Key/Owner:
Once you have obtained a license from www.AASync.com, enter the key and the owner EXACTLY as they are given. Preferably, you should copy/paste to avoid misspelling errors. After entering the correct strings in both fields, click "Set". If the license is accepted, it will appear in the Found Licenses section.

How does it work?

Finding Licenses: In order to run, AASync has to find a valid license. Licenses are stored in files in certain folders. By default, the app wrapper (AASync.app), ~/Library/Licenses/AASync and /Licenses/AASync are searched. To add folders to this list click "Add" in the top section of the Registry Panel. Upon startup, AASync will scan these folders (defined in the RBReadLicenseDirs default), and pick the highest level valid license it can find. Expired or otherwise invalid licenses will be ignored. So, if you have a Basic and a Professional license both accessible, AASync try to use the Professional one. If it turns out that this license is already used on the same network, AASync will go down the list of valid licenses until it finds one it can use, or you will get an error panel informing you of the license situation.

License Limit Exceeded: Each license has a serial number that identifies it (the # field in the tables). The same license cannot be used on more hosts at the same time. The license server keeps track of how many users use which licenses. If you get the License Limit Exceeded error as you start up AASync, that means you need more licenses... Or just quit one copy. Another one can then be launched on the same LAN.

Saving Licenses: When you enter the license string into the Registry Panel and click "Enter License," AASync will check to see if the license is valid. If so, it will ask you where to save the license file. There are different ways of saving this license file depending on whether or not you want to make the license available for others. By default, AASync will save the license in
<YOUR_HOME>/Library/Licenses/AASync. In this case, this will be your personal license, since no other user can see it. To make the license available for others you have two choices:

1. Shared: In this case AASync will attempt to save the license in /Library/Licenses/AASync. You have to be the administrative user to do this, otherwise you are not permitted to write into /Library. Once the license is saved, all users on this host will be able to use the license.
2. Custom: In case of network installations there is usually a shared folder on a server. Selecting the "Custom" option allows you to save the license into such a folder, and by doing so, making the license available to all users on the local LAN. If the license is in a custom folder, make sure this folder is added to the list of folders searched by AASync for licenses (click "Add" in the top section of the Registry Panel).

Please note: Once the license is saved the license file cannot be moved or copied! Doing so will invalidate this file, and the license key will have to be entered again. You must use AASync to save the license where you want by the options described above. This is to make sure unauthorized persons cannot steal a license.

It is imperative that you hold onto the original license key and the e-mail that was sent to you. If you perform a "clean" system installation, move your home folder from one drive to another, restore from backup, etc. you will need to re-enter the license information.

Network Installation:

The next thing is to make sure the copies of AASync that are started on the client machines will know where to look for the license. You can tell each client where the license is (read RBReadLicenseDirs above) but that is very tedious when you have a lot of clients. It is simpler to simply change the global default value of RBReadLicenseDirs that is stored inside the installed copy of AASync on the server.

Here is how: inside AASync.app there is Contents/Resources/GlobalDefaults.xml. Using your favorite text(or xml) editor open this file for editing. Be sure to keep a backup copy just in case you mess it up. Look for the RBReadLicenseDirs section:
<key>RBReadLicenseDirs</key>
<array>
<string>~/Library/Licenses/AASync</string>
<string>/Library/Licenses/AASync</string>
</array>
Add another line to it which contains the license directory path as seen FROM THE CLIENT:
<key>RBReadLicenseDirs</key>
<array>
<string>~/Library/Licenses/AASync</string>
<string>/Library/Licenses/AASync</string>
<string>/Local/Library/Licenses/AASync</string>
</array>
Save and you are done. Be VERY CAREFUL! If you mess up the xml format, AASync will not be able to read this file.