Technical Document #1003

Subject: Transferring the keyless security between two sites without a diskette

Product: All Digital Formation Products

Last Updated: February 22, 1999

Overview

This document describes how to keep a copy of a Digital Formation software product running on two different computers. The difficulty lies with transferring the license between the two computers. When transferring over two computers on a network, the Direct Transfer method may be used. The Floppy Disk Transfer is easily used to transfer between two computers not on a network, but the procedure requires moving a floppy disk between the two computers. This is very easy when the two computers are in close proximity to one another, but is extremely inconvenient when they are not (such as at the office and at home). This document describes a technique for transferring a valid license between two remote computers, without using a diskette. This technique is very similar to the one outlined in Technical Document #1001 (Tech1001.htm), but instead the license is transferred using e-mail attachments.

Details

For the purposes of this description, we'll assume you want to transfer between an office desktop PC and a laptop PC on the road. This technique should be followed VERY closely. If you are careful, this technique will work flawlessly.

Let's assume that currently the office desktop has the valid license, and that you are on the road with your laptop and need the license transferred there.

Do a Register Transfer on the laptop using any particular directory on the hard-drive. Send the *.REG file from that directory to your secretary at the office via e-mail attachment.
Your secretary downloads the *.REG file from the e-mail into any particular directory onto the desktop machine, and then runs the Transfer Out function to that directory.
The resulting *.REG file from the above step is e-mailed back to you and your laptop, where you download it into any particular directory on the hard-drive and run the Transfer In function. The appropriate license files will automatically be generated by the function, and the procedure ends at this point with the license having been transferred.

To transfer the license back to the office desktop, you can follow this procedure again but swapping the two computers in the sequence. Or you can do a Floppy Disk Transfer when you return to the office (see Technical Document #1001 (Tech1001.htm)).

Conclusions

The technique has a couple of obvious drawbacks; 1) it's complicated, and 2) it depends on the speed of e-mail delivery. But the advantages are also clear; you can work on two computers, at remote sites, without having to purchase multiple copies of the software, and without having to have any physical contact between the two sites. This technique ensures that the software will not operate on more than one computer simultaneously (thus ensuring the license agreement is not violated).