JP2008123048A - Software license operation management device and software license operation management method - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To reduce the necessary number of software licenses to the minimum by effectively utilizing the license of charge software. <P>SOLUTION: The use results of each user are totaled from a log for recording the use dates of each user of software, and written in a use result table. Afterwards, a use result check part outputs the list of license erasure object users according to the use results of users within a predetermined period, and deprives the licenses of software from the users which have not used the software for a long period. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2008,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention is a software license operation management that can delete licenses of unused users based on information on the use of software in an environment where a plurality of people use software in an organization such as a company. The present invention relates to an apparatus and a method.

A CPU license and a named license are often used as a license system when a plurality of people use paid software.
The CPU license is a license system in which a license price is determined according to the number of CPUs of a computer on which software is installed regardless of the number of users.
A named license is a license system in which a license price is determined according to the number of users.
Prior art documents relating to the license are shown in Patent Document 1.
JP 2006-279935 A

There is paid software that uses multiple license systems based on named licenses.
This software has different license prices depending on the functions provided.
As an example, paid software consisting of application A, application B, and application C will be described.
Application A is the most expensive and provides the most functionality.
Application B is slightly less expensive than application A, and provides fewer functions than application A.
Application C is the least expensive and provides fewer functions than Application B.
A person who has a license for application A can also use application B and application C.
A person who has a license for application B can use application C, but cannot use application A.
A person who has a license for application C can use only application C, and cannot use application A and application B.
When the employees in the company use paid software with such a configuration, the frequency of use of each application becomes a problem.
When the user of the expensive application A does not use the application A at all, the license is not used effectively.
If such a user uses only the application C, granting a license for the application C instead of depriving the license for the application A leads to effective use of the license.
In addition, if managed in this way, it can be expected to reduce the number of expensive licenses.

  The present invention has been made in view of this point, and an object thereof is to provide a software license operation management apparatus and method that promote effective use of software licenses.

  In the present invention for solving the above problems, the log analysis unit totals the usage results for each user from the log recording the usage date and time for each user of the software, and writes it in the usage result table. After that, the usage record check unit reads the license management table storing the license grant status for each user and the usage record table, and outputs a list of license deletion target users according to the user's use record within a predetermined period. is there.

When the usage state of the software is periodically counted and a user who has not been used at all is found, it is determined that the user no longer needs the license, and the deletion process is executed.
Prior to the deletion process, a warning process may be included as a deletion notice.

  According to the present invention, it is possible to provide a license management apparatus and method capable of effectively utilizing an expensive software license within a company.

  Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to FIGS.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an in-house network centered on a license management personal computer (hereinafter, “PC” is abbreviated as “PC”) on which a license management program operates, according to an embodiment of the present invention.
A LAN 102 is laid in a building of a certain company. A PC (employee A client PC 103, employee B client PC 104, employee C client PC 105, etc.) is assigned to the LAN 102 for each employee.
On the other hand, a paid software providing server 106 is also connected to the LAN 102. The paid software providing server 106 stores an application A 107, an application B 108, and an application C 109, which are business application software development tools used by employees.
Application A107, application B108, and application C109 are managed for each employee who is a user. This is the user authentication table 110. The user authentication table 110 records the ID of an employee who is a user and the presence or absence of a corresponding license.
Application A 107, application B 108, and application C 109 additionally record the date and time used by the user in log A 111, log B 112, and log C 113, respectively.
Log A111, log B112, and log C113 are text files. Details of these will be described later.

Each employee uses application A 107, application B 108, and application C 109 through each PC (employee A client PC 103, employee B client PC 104, employee C client PC 105, etc.). The protocol is, for example, HTTP (Hyper Text Transfer Protocol). Employees use cookies (cookies: a mechanism whereby a web site provider temporarily writes and stores data on a visitor's computer through a web browser. In most cases, it is composed of a one-byte character string of alphabets and numbers. ), The application A 107, the application B 108, and the application C 109 are used. In addition, although there is web server software such as Apache (http://www.apache.org/) in the paid software providing server 106, the protocol using the application A is not a main part of the invention. The illustration is omitted.
Each employee is set to determine whether or not the application can be used in accordance with the license assigned to each employee and managed in the user authentication table 110.
In FIG. 1, the application A 107 can be used only by those who have an “AA license”.
The application B 108 can be used by a person having an “AB license” and a person having an “AA license”.
The application C109 can be used by a person having an “AC license”, a person having an “AB license”, and a person having an “AA license”.
That is, the highest license is the AA license, then the AB license, and the lowest license is the AC license. Each license includes a subordinate license.
Therefore, the AA license holder can use all of the applications A 107, B, and C.
An AB license holder cannot use application A 107 instead of using applications B 108 and C.
An AC license holder can use only the application C109, and cannot use the applications A107 and B.

On the other hand, the license management PC 114 is a PC used by the employee Y, who is one of the employees, and is connected to the LAN 102 in the same manner as the employee A client PC 103, the employee B client PC 104, the employee C client PC 105, and the like. Its hardware is almost the same as other PCs. However, as for software, the license management program according to the present embodiment is stored in a non-volatile storage such as an HDD (not shown) incorporated therein.
Employee Y operates the license management program of the license management PC 114 once a month as a license management business, and performs the license management business. For each employee, the usage count of the application is acquired from the logs A111, B, and C, and the following processing is performed according to the usage record.
A warning e-mail is sent to employees who have not used the service for 3 months, saying that if there is no use for 3 months, the license will be deleted.
For employees who have not used it for six months, send a deletion notice email stating "Please reply to your defense within a week. Otherwise, the license will be deleted." .
Then, the remaining licenses are reassigned to the employees who have applied for use by deleting them.
In this way, by checking monthly, effective use of the licenses owned is intended.
In the present embodiment, the mail server 115 connected to the LAN 102 is used for the purpose of collectively sending a warning mail and a deletion notice mail to the corresponding employee.

Hereinafter, for convenience of explanation, the OS of the license management PC 114 is Microsoft's Windows (registered trademark), and the paid software providing server 106 is a POSIX (Portable Operating System Interface for UNIX) (UNIX is a registered trademark) OS. This will be described on the assumption. Of course, the technical idea of the present invention is not limited to the OS.
In a non-volatile storage (not shown) of the license management PC 114, a license check program created by a worksheet of Excel, which is spreadsheet software of Microsoft Corporation, is stored. In addition, the license check program is not limited to this, and the SSH client software and the SCP client software cooperate.
SSH is an abbreviation for Secure SHell, which is an encryption of TELNET, which is mainly used in POSIX OS. It is possible to log in to another computer via a network, execute a command on a remote machine, and copy a file to another machine (SCP: Secure COpy).
The SSH client software is for the license management PC 114 to make an SSH connection to the paid software providing server 106. After the SSH connection, a predetermined filtering process is performed from the log A111, the log B112, and the log C113, and a command for creating a usage record table to be described later is executed. Details of the command will be described later.
The SCP client software is software for downloading the created usage record table to the license management PC 114 using the SSH protocol.
In other words, the SSH daemon is running on the paid software providing server 106, and only authorized users who have a predetermined account can make an SSH connection to the license management PC 114.

FIG. 2 is a functional block diagram of the license management PC 114.
The main functions of the license management PC 114 in this embodiment are provided by a license management program.
The license management program can be in any implementation format. In the present embodiment, as an example, it is assumed that it is constituted by an Excel worksheet and some external commands as described above.
In the worksheet 202, a license management table 203, a usage record table 204, and a check program 205 are stored. Then, the check program 205 checks these two tables to create a list of the warning target employees and the deletion notification target employees described above. This is the batch transmission mail target person list 206.
Among the AA license holders, a list of employees who have never used the last three months is the AA warning list 207.
Among the AB license holders, the list of employees who have never used the last three months is the AB warning list 208.
Among the AC license holders, an AC warning list 209 is a list of employees who have never used the last three months.
Among the AA license holders, a list of employees who have never used the last six months is the AA deletion list 210.
Among the AB license holders, the list of employees who have never used the last six months is the AB deletion list 211.
Among the AC license holders, a list of employees who have never used the last six months is an AC deletion list 212.
These batch transmission mail target person lists 206 are used by the mail server 115 for batch transmission of warning mails or deletion notice mails.
The log analysis unit 213 provides a function of performing predetermined filtering processing on the log A 111, the log B 112, and the log C 113, and recording the usage record total result for each employee in the usage record table 204. As an example, an SSH client, an SCP client, and commands executed on the paid software providing server 106 are included. Therefore, the log analysis unit 213 is not necessarily completed in the license management PC 114.

FIG. 3 schematically shows the contents of the license management table 203 and the usage record table 204.
The license management table 203 includes field names such as employee name, employee ID,
AA license flag, AA exception period, AA review,
AB license flag, AB exception period, AB review,
Each field includes an AC license flag, an AC exception period, and an AC review.
The AA license flag is a binary field, 1 means license, 0 means no license.
The AA exception period is a numerical field indicating a monthly unit. 0 indicates no exception period, 1 indicates an exception period of one month, 6 indicates an exception period of six months, and so on. Depending on the employee, executives such as officer class rarely use the license, but may want to be able to use it in an emergency, so there is a maximum value such as “9999” for such employees. Or setting.
AA review is a field in which marking is performed at the time of usage record aggregation.
Prior to tabulation processing, all the fields are initialized to empty, and as a result of the result judgment, “3” is entered when it is not used for three months, and “6” is entered here when it is not used for six months. To do.
In the totaling process, the employee IDs whose “3” is recorded in this field are totaled to create the AA warning list 207, and the employee IDs whose “6” is recorded are totaled to the AA deletion list 210. Create
The AB license flag, AB exception period, AB review, AC license flag, AC exception period, and AC fields have the same meaning as the AA license flag, AA exception period, and AA review described above.

The usage record table 204 has an employee ID,
AA 6 months use record,
AA 3 months use record,
AB 6 months use record,
AB 3 months use record,
AC 6 months use record,
Each field of AC 3 month usage record is provided.
In each field, the number of times the application corresponding to the license is used during the last three or six months is recorded.

FIG. 4A is an example of a log. Log A 111 is a text file consisting of a 12-digit date / time field consisting of a 4-digit year, a 2-digit month, a 2-digit day, and a 2-digit time according to the Western calendar, and an employee ID field.
A comma is used as a field separator.
The employee Y uses the license management PC 114 to perform an SSH login to the paid software providing server 106 and issues the following command.
[Equation 1]
awk'BEGIN {FS = ","} / ^ 2006 (0 [89] | 10) / {print $ 2} '/var/log/app/AA.log|sort|uniq -c> /tmp/AA_list.txt

“Awk”, “sort”, and “uniq” are well-known filter commands in the POSIX OS. It has been ported to MS-DOS (registered trademark) and many other OSs, and is also available on Windows.
awk is an interpreter specialized for text filter functions. In the above command line,
Prior to entering text (BEGIN statement),
Set the field separator of the input string to a comma (system variable FS)
For a line that contains any of the characters "200608", "200609", and "200610" from the beginning of the regular expression (/ ^ 2006 (0 [89] | 10) /),
Print the second field to standard output (print $ 2)
To /var/log/app/AA.log.
Thus, only the ID of the user (employee) who used the application A 107 during August, September and October 2006 is output to the standard output.
This output is rearranged by sort, the duplicates are collected by uniq, duplicate lines are counted, and redirected to /tmp/AA_list.txt. In the uniq command character string, "-c" is an option switch, which means a function that outputs the number of duplicate lines counted.
The output result is shown in FIG. That is, the number of times the employee ID appears within the specified period is the number of uses.
In this way, the text file of the aggregation result output to /tmp/AA_list.txt is downloaded by the SCP client and read into the usage record table 204.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart of the license management program, which is the first license management service in the license management PC 114.
Here, “first” is described because there is an operation of FIG. 6 to be described later one week after this series of processing.
When the process is started (S501), first, an SSH login is performed to the paid software providing server 106, and the above-described command is executed from the log for each license to update the usage record table 204 (S502).
Next, the AA exception period, AB exception period, and AC exception period in the license management table 203 are decremented by 1 for one or more fields. In addition, the AA review, AB review, and AC review fields of all users are emptied (S503).
Then, for each user in the license management table 203, a license check process is performed to determine whether 6 months have not been used (S504).
Further, a license check process is performed for each user in the license management table 203 to determine whether or not it has been unused for three months (S505).
By these license check processes, a batch transmission mail target person list 206 is obtained.
Next, the 6-month check process batch send mail target person list 206 and the 3-month check process batch send mail target person list 206 are collated, and the duplicate employee IDs are subjected to the 3-month check process batch send mail target. A process of deleting from the user list 206 is performed (S506). That is, it is clear that an employee who has not been used for 6 months is unused for 3 months, and it is not necessary to send a warning mail which has not been used for 3 months to such an employee.
Finally, batch mail transmission processing is performed in the mail server 115 (S507), and a series of processing ends (S508).

FIG. 6 is a flowchart of the license deletion process, which is the final process of the license management business. However, although it is a flow, most of the determination processing is human processing.
When one week has elapsed from the series of processes shown in FIG. 5 (S601), it is verified whether or not an excuse e-mail has been received from a deletion target employee (user) who has not been used for 6 months (S602).
The user who has not received a reply email for the defense deletes the license at this point (S603).
If a reply e-mail is received, whether the reason for the defense is appropriate is examined (S604).
If the reason for excuse is not specified or invalid, the license is deleted (S603).
If the reason for excuse is reasonable, “6” is entered in the exceptional period of the corresponding license of the user in order to give a further grace (S605). That is, a 6 month grace period is given to the corresponding license of the user. Then, a series of processing ends (S606).
The processing in FIG. 5 and the processing in FIG. 6 described above is a rough flow of license deletion processing.

Hereinafter, FIGS. 7 to 12 mainly describe the processing contents of FIG. 5 in detail.
7 and 8 are flowcharts showing a check process for unused employees for six months. This corresponds to step S504 in FIG. That is, it is a process for checking whether or not an application for which the employee has a license has not been used for six months and creating a list of license deletion notice mail transmission target persons.
When the process is started (S701), attention is paid to the first record in the license management table 203 (S702). In other words, this is the first step of the loop processing that performs processing from the first record to the last record in order.
The subsequent processing is a process of checking the usage record for each license in the order of AA license, AB license, and AC license.
First, it is verified whether the AA license holder has an exclusion period of 1 or more or has a usage record (S703).
Looking at the license management table 203, if it is an AA license owner and the AA exclusion period is 1 or more, it is not yet a deletion target.
In addition, when the record of the user ID in the usage record table 204 is viewed and the AA 6 month usage record field is 1 or more, it is used at least once in at least 6 months. Get out.
Next, a process for finding a user who has no usage record for the AA license owner is performed (S704).
Look at the license management table 203,
AA license holder and AA exclusion period is 0, and
Look at the record of the user ID in the usage record table 204,
AA 6 month usage record field is 0
Then, although it is an AA license owner, it is not used even once in 6 months.
Such users are subject to AA license deletion. Therefore, “6” is entered in the “AA review” field as a mark (S705).
If “N” in this branch determination, the user does not have an AA license.

Next, for the AB license owner, the same processing is performed for the previous AA license owner.
First, it is verified whether the exclusion period of the AB license owner is 1 or more or whether there is a usage record (S706).
Looking at the license management table 203, if the license owner is an AB license and the AB exclusion period is 1 or more, it is not yet a deletion target.
In addition, when the record of the user ID in the usage record table 204 is viewed, if the AB 6 month usage record field is 1 or more, it is used at least once in at least 6 months. Get out.
Next, a process of finding a user who has no usage record for the AB license owner is performed (S707).
Look at the license management table 203,
AB license holder and AB exclusion period is 0, and
Look at the record of the user ID in the usage record table 204,
AB 6 months usage record field is 0
Then, although it is an AB license owner, it is not used even once in 6 months.
Such users are subject to AB license deletion. Therefore, “6” is entered in the “AB review” field as a mark (S708).
If “N” in this branch determination, the user does not have an AB license.

Next, with respect to the AC license owner, the same processing is performed for the previous AA license owner and AB license owner.
First, it is verified whether the exclusion period of the AC license owner is 1 or more or whether there is a usage record (S809).
Looking at the license management table 203, if it is an AC license owner and the AC exclusion period is 1 or more, it is not yet a deletion target.
In addition, when the record of the user ID in the usage record table 204 is viewed and the AC 6 month usage record field is 1 or more, it is used at least once in at least 6 months. Get out.
Next, a process for finding a user who has no usage record for the AC license owner is performed (S810).
Look at the license management table 203,
AC license owner and AC exclusion period is 0, and
Look at the record of the user ID in the usage record table 204,
AC 6 month usage record field is 0
Then, although it is an AC license owner, it is not used even once in 6 months.
Such users are subject to AC license deletion. Therefore, “6” is entered in the “AC review” field as a mark (S811).
If “N” in this branch determination, the user does not have an AC license.

  With the license check process described above, “6” is added to the “review” field for each license for licenses that have not been used for six months. On the other hand, if there is a usage record or the exclusion period is 1 or more, the “review” field remains blank.

  When a series of license check processing is completed for a certain record (user), the presence or absence of the next record is verified (S812). If there is a next record, a series of license check processing is performed again for the next record (S813).

After performing the license check process for all records (Y in S812), paying attention to the “review” field, a deletion list is created for each license.
A record in which “6” is entered in the AA review field is a user targeted for AA license deletion. Therefore, the user ID of this record is output to the AA deletion list 210 (S814).
A record in which “6” is entered in the AB review field is an AB license deletion target user. Therefore, the user ID of this record is output to the AB deletion list 211 (S815).
A record in which “6” is entered in the AC review field is a user who is subject to AC license deletion. Therefore, the user ID of this record is output to the AC deletion list 212 (S816).
In this way, a series of 6-month unused employee check processing is completed (S817).

FIG. 9 and FIG. 10 are flowcharts showing the check process for unused employees for three months. This corresponds to step S505 in FIG. In other words, it is a process for checking whether or not an application for which the employee has a license has been used for three months and creating a list of license warning mail transmission target persons.
When the process is started (S901), attention is paid to the first record in the license management table 203 (S902). In other words, this is the first step of the loop processing that performs processing from the first record to the last record in order.
The subsequent processing is a process of checking the usage record for each license in the order of AA license, AB license, and AC license.
First, it is verified whether the AA license owner has an exclusion period of 1 or more or has a usage record (S903).
If the license management table 203 is viewed and the AA license owner is at least 1 and the AA exclusion period is 1 or more, it is not yet a warning target.
In addition, when the record of the user ID in the usage record table 204 is viewed and the AA three-month usage record field is 1 or more, it is used at least once in at least three months. Get out.
Next, a process for finding a user who has no usage record for the AA license owner is performed (S904).
Look at the license management table 203,
AA license holder and AA exclusion period is 0, and
Look at the record of the user ID in the usage record table 204,
AA 3-month usage record field is 0
Then, although it is an AA license holder, it is not used even once in three months.
Such users are subject to AA license warnings. Therefore, “3” is entered in the “AA review” field as a mark (S905).
If “N” in this branch determination, the user does not have an AA license.

Next, for the AB license owner, the same processing is performed for the previous AA license owner.
First, it is verified whether the exclusion period of the AB license owner is 1 or more or whether there is a usage record (S906).
Looking at the license management table 203, if the license owner is an AB license and the AB exclusion period is 1 or more, it is not yet a warning target.
In addition, when the record of the user ID in the usage record table 204 is viewed and the AB 3 month usage record field is 1 or more, it is used at least once in at least 3 months. Get out.
Next, a process of finding a user who has no usage record for the AB license owner is performed (S907).
Look at the license management table 203,
AB license holder and AB exclusion period is 0, and
Look at the record of the user ID in the usage record table 204,
AB 3-month usage record field is 0
Then, although it is an AB license owner, it is not used even once in three months.
Such users are subject to AB license warnings. Therefore, “3” is entered in the “AB review” field as a mark (S908).
If “N” in this branch determination, the user does not have an AB license.

Next, with respect to the AC license owner, the same processing is performed for the previous AA license owner and AB license owner.
First, it is verified whether the exclusion period of the AC license owner is 1 or more or whether there is a usage record (S1009).
Looking at the license management table 203, if the user is an AC license owner and the AC exclusion period is 1 or more, it is not yet a warning target.
In addition, when the user ID record in the usage record table 204 is viewed, if the AC 3 month usage record field is 1 or more, it is used at least once in at least 3 months. Get out.
Next, a process of finding a user who has no usage record for the AC license owner is performed (S1010).
Look at the license management table 203,
AC license owner and AC exclusion period is 0, and
Look at the record of the user ID in the usage record table 204,
AC 3 months usage field is 0
Then, although it is an AC license owner, it is not used even once in three months.
Such users are subject to AC license warning. Therefore, “3” is entered in the “AC review” field as a mark (S1011).
If “N” in this branch determination, the user does not have an AC license.

  In the license check process described above, “3” is added to the “review” field for each license for licenses that have not been used for three months. On the other hand, if there is a usage record or the exclusion period is 1 or more, the “review” field remains blank.

  When a series of license check processing is completed for a certain record (user), the presence / absence of the next record is verified (S1012). If there is, a series of license check processing is performed again for the next record (S1013).

After performing the license check process for all records, pay attention to the “review” field and create a warning list for each license.
A record in which “3” is entered in the AA review field is a user subject to AA license warning. Therefore, the user ID of this record is output to the AA warning list 207 (S1014).
A record in which “3” is entered in the AB review field is an AB license warning target user. Therefore, the user ID of this record is output to the AB warning list 208 (S1015).
A record in which “3” is entered in the AC review field is an AC license warning target user. Therefore, the user ID of this record is output to the AC warning list 209 (S1016).
In this way, a series of check processes for unused employees for 3 months is completed (S1017).

FIG. 11 is a diagram conceptually showing the processing contents for comparing the AA deletion list 210 and the AA warning list 207 and deleting the duplicate user ID from the AA warning list 207.
In FIG. 11, the ID “1023” in the AA warning list 207 also exists in the AA deletion list 210. Therefore, the ID “1023” in the AA warning list 207 is deleted.
Similarly, the ID “1038” in the AA warning list 207 also exists in the AA deletion list 210. Therefore, the ID “1038” in the AA warning list 207 is deleted.
FIG. 12 is a flowchart of the duplicate deletion process. These apply not only to the AA warning list 207 but also to both the AB warning list 208 and the AC warning list 209.
When the process is started (S1201), the head of the warning list is first viewed (S1202). Then, it is verified whether or not the user ID is in the same type of deletion list (S1203).
If the user ID is in the same type of deletion list, since the ID is duplicated, the user ID is deleted from the warning list (S1204).
Then, the presence / absence of the next user is checked (S1205). If there is a next user, the duplication check process is performed again (S1203). If not, the process is terminated (S1206).

The following application examples can be considered in the present embodiment.
(1) When the order of the 6-month unused employee check process and the 3-month unused employee check process in FIG. 5 is reversed, the duplicate record is automatically deleted by executing the 6-month unused employee check process. Therefore, there is no need to perform duplicate record deletion processing again. That is, if the 6-month check is performed after the 3-month check is first performed, the same operation as the duplicate record deletion process is performed by overwriting “3” written in the “review” field with “6”.

  (2) Instead of performing SSH login to the paid software providing server 106, a predetermined command is registered in cron (a daemon program that is periodically executed at a specified date and time in the POSIX OS). Prior to the license check process in the license management PC 114, the log totaling process can be automatically executed. The license management PC 114 only needs to download the files that have been tabulated by the SCP client.

  (3) In the above-described embodiment, the license deletion processing and the like are finally manual operations. This can also be configured to manipulate the license field in the user authentication table 110 directly from the worksheet.

  In the present embodiment, it is possible to provide a license management apparatus that can effectively use an expensive software license within a company. This management method makes it possible to reduce the required number of expensive software licenses.

  The embodiment of the present invention has been described above. However, the present invention is not limited to the above-described embodiment, and other modifications may be made without departing from the gist of the present invention described in the claims. It goes without saying that application examples are included.

1 is a block diagram of an in-house network centered on a license management personal computer that runs a license management program according to an embodiment of the present invention. FIG. It is a functional block diagram of a license management personal computer. It is the schematic which shows the content of a license management table and a utilization track record table. It is the schematic which shows an example of a log, and the content of an output result. It is a flowchart of a license management program. It is a flowchart of the deletion process of a license. It is a flowchart which shows the 6-month unused employee check process. It is a flowchart which shows the 6-month unused employee check process. It is a flowchart which shows the check process of a 3-month unused employee. It is a flowchart which shows the check process of a 3-month unused employee. It is a conceptual diagram which shows the processing content which compares an AA deletion list and an AA warning list, and deletes a duplicate user ID from an AA warning list. It is a flowchart of a duplication deletion process.

Explanation of symbols

  DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 102 ... LAN, 103 ... Client PC for employee A, 104 ... Client PC for employee B, 105 ... Client PC for employee C, 106 ... Server for providing paid software, 107 ... Application A, 108 ... Application B, 109 ... Application C, DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 110 ... User authentication table, 111 ... Log A, 112 ... Log B, 113 ... Log C, 114 ... License management PC, 115 ... Mail server, 202 ... Worksheet, 203 ... License management table, 204 ... Usage record table, 205 ... Check program 206. Batch mail recipient list 207 AA warning list 208 AB AB list 209 AC warning list 210 AA deletion list 211 AB deletion list 212 AC deletion list 213 ... log solution Part

Claims (4)

A license management table for storing the license grant status for each user;
From a log that records the usage date and time for each user of the paid software, a log analysis unit that totals usage results for each user
A usage record table in which a usage record for each user is recorded by the log analysis unit;
Software license operation management comprising: a usage record check unit that reads the license management table and the usage record table and outputs a list of license deletion target users according to the user record of use within a predetermined period apparatus. The log analysis unit aggregates the first usage period and the second usage period that is longer than the first usage period, and records the result in the usage record table,
The usage record check unit outputs a list of license warning target users related to the first usage period and outputs a list of license deletion target users related to the second usage period. The software license operation management apparatus according to 1. A first step of counting the usage results for each user from the log recording the usage date and time for each user of the software, and writing to the usage result table;
A license management table storing a license granting status for each user, and a second step of reading the usage record table and outputting a list of license deletion target users according to the user's use record within a predetermined period. Software license operation management method characterized by the above. In the first step, the usage results for each user are tabulated for each of a first usage period and a second usage period that is longer than the first usage period.
The second step outputs a list of license warning target users related to the first usage period and outputs a list of license deletion target users related to the second usage period. Item 4. The software license operation management method according to item 3.

Images