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ArchiCAD user licence allocation (USB key/CodeMeter)

Gerald D Lock
Advocate
Hi, not sure where to find information that clearly documents/explains how ArchiCAD allocates user licences ('seats'), so I'm posting a question here. Please feel free to move the question to the proper forum.

My understanding over many long years of use is that each VERSION of ArchiCAD that a user has running on their workstation will take up one licence 'seat' from the total available.

for example, a hypothetical office has 4 commercial licences.
Today:
- user A has 1 instance of ArchiCAD 20 running = 1 seat
- user B has 3 instances of ArchiCAD 23 running = 1 seat
- user C has 1 instance of ArchiCAD 23 and 1 instance of ArchiCAD 24 running = 2 seats

Total used = 4 seats

- if user D tries to open a project now (regardless of what version), they will get the message that no licences are available
- if user A tries to open a project in ArchiCAD 20, they can do so without taking an extra seat.

Please correct me if I'm wrong (or where exceptions might occur) and please point me to where Graphisoft clearly states the rules on licence allocation/usage.

Thanks
ArchiCAD 24 (build 5004)

MacBook Pro (16-inch, 2021) Apple M1 Pro 32GB RAM | MacOS 12.0.1



Melbourne, Australia
4 REPLIES 4
Brett Brown
Advocate
My understanding is versions only matter on what version the license is. You can run any number of instances of the the licensed version or lower.

If you have four version 24 licenses, each user (4) can run any number of instances of any versions on the same computer and that counts as one seat. 4 seats, four computers.

Your user C is only one seat and you are saying he is taking up 2 seats? Doesn't sound right to me.
Imac, Big Sur AC 20 NZ, AC 25 Solo UKI,
Lingwisyer
Guru
I have run 21, 22 and 23 all at the same time on my machine with no issue. This being with a single user dongle, but I cannot see why a multi-seat licence would be any different...

AC22-23 AUS 7000Help Those Help You - Add a Signature
Self-taught, bend it till it breaksCreating a Thread
Win10 | R5 2600 | 16GB | GTX1660 
Barry Kelly
Moderator
From my experience, what Gerald describes is correct for network licenses.
Start a version, it counts as one license used.
Same users starts more of the same version, still only one license is used.
Same user starts a different version, a second license is used.

I have had to kick users out because they have multiple versions open and they have used multiple licenses.

If you have a single license, you can open as many versions and as many instances as you like.
I regularly have multiple copies of 20, 22, 24 & 25 running at the same time all from one license.

As I say that is my experience and is with the hardware keys (silver USB).
I don't know if the same applies for software licenses, as I don't use them.

Barry.
One of the forum moderators.
Versions 6.5 to 27
Dell XPS- i7-6700 @ 3.4Ghz, 16GB ram, GeForce GTX 960 (2GB), Windows 10
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Minh Nguyen
Graphisoft Alumni
Graphisoft Alumni
Dear all,

Thank you very much for the discussion! This is an interesting one.

From my experience, there should not be any difference between how single keys and NET keys work. No matter how many Archicad instances opened, regardless of their versions, one user should take only one license only.

There are some special cases (like working on remote desktop connection), but in general, if everyone is connecting to the internal network where the key is in, they should only take one license for each session.

As this may require further investigation, I suggest contacting the local support if you are concern about the situation. Thank you very much for your help and understanding! Feel free to reach out if you have any further questions!

Best regards,
Minh

Minh Nguyen
Technical Support Engineer
GRAPHISOFT