Infochem converted their robust FORTRAN application from dongle-based licensing to a file-based system using RLM, reducing support costs while increasing customer satisfaction. According to Dr. Richard Szczepanski, Director, “We have always regarded a licensing system as an essential part of our software. We started using a dongle-based system in the early 1990s and this has developed over the years stand-alone installations to network licenses. Dongles are not always popular with customers but they do an effective job of controlling licenses.”
“We chose RLM to enable a complete electronic delivery of the software product and license. In the past we have considered a number of license-file based systems but poor experiences as users of these systems and high costs prevented us from adopting them for our own software.”
“It is simple to sum up our experience with Reprise and RLM: we are happy and our customers are happy.”
About InfoChem:
Infochem is a specialist engineering company that provides thermodynamic modeling software and consultancy services to the oil & gas, process and chemical industries. We have been established for over twenty years. Our principal software product, Multiflash, is a powerful and versatile program for modeling physical properties and phase equilibria involving any number of fluid and solid phases. It is used by engineers worldwide, either as a stand-alone program or in conjunction with other software. Typical applications include flow assurance and life-of-field studies for the oil industry, pipeline network modeling and process design and optimisation. A complementary product, FloWax, simulates the deposition of wax from oils and condensates in multiphase pipelines.
We have always regarded a licensing system as an essential part of our software. We started using a dongle-based system in the early 1990s and this has developed over the years from parallel port dongles to USB dongles and from stand-alone installations to network licenses. Dongles are not always popular with customers but they do an effective job of controlling licenses.
It is a common complaint among software suppliers that the licensing system consumes an uncomfortably-high proportion of support effort. It has certainly been our experience over many years. This was one of the main reasons for investigating alternative license control systems. Another was to enable a complete electronic delivery of the software product and license. In the past we have considered a number of license-file based systems but poor experiences as users of these systems and high costs decided us against adopting them for our own software. We were aware of RLM for some time before we decided to try an evaluation. We talked to other users and their positive comments convinced us to go ahead.
Our software is written in Fortran so we needed some help to get to grips with the API. Reprise put us in touch with another Fortran user and that made the task simpler. Overall our experience was good. The product performed well and met our requirements. Our software comes as a basic product plus a number of optional modules; we provide node-locked and floating licenses and we issue short-term evaluation licenses. All this is well-supported by RLM. In particular, the cost and effort of providing evaluation licenses has decreased dramatically because there is no hardware device to deal with. The process is smoother, faster and simpler for prospective customers.
The transition to RLM has been transparent to our customers because we are using the dongle system and RLM in parallel. We have a single program that incorporates both licensing libraries. New licenses are RLM-based and, although it is still early-days, the support effort has indeed decreased. Most importantly, we have not been faced with any of the long trouble-shooting investigations that were sometimes necessary in the past. We are still learning but the effort has been worthwhile.