Bentley Licensing Tool

What is the purpose of this information?

The Bentley Licensing Tool provides activation functions and information for products utilizing Subscription Entitlement Service. It is installed with the CONNECTION Client. 

• Opening the Bentley Licensing Tool
• The Entitlements Tab
• Checkout License Tab
• Product Status Tab
• Importing a License
• Configuring Proxy Settings
• Configuring Error Logging Settings
• Refresh and Reset Policy
• Manually Sending Logs
• Gathering Diagnostic Logs
• Submitting Feedback and Feature Requests

We welcome your feedback and suggestions.  Please visit the Bentley License Client Ideas portal to post your own suggestions or vote on other suggestions from others in the Community.

Opening the Bentley Licensing Tool

Option 1 - from CONNECTION Client

Using the 'License Tool' item in the CONNECTION Client drop-down menu (starting from version 11.00.05.34):

Option 2 - from the Windows Start or Search

1. Open the Windows Start menu.

2. Type "Bentley Licensing".

3. Select Bentley Licensing Tool from the search results that appear.

Option 3 - from the file location

Open the executable directly from the file location, which by default is: C:\Program Files\Common Files\Bentley Shared\CONNECTION Client\LicService\Bentley.Licensing.LicenseTool.exe 

The Entitlements Tab

When the Bentley Licensing Tool opens it displays the Entitlements tab. If the CONNECTION Client is signed in, a Bentley login will appear in the upper left corner. Products appear in the Entitlements list if they have communicated with Bentley before. They will communicate the following information:

• Product: This is the name of the product using Subscription Entitlement Service. Products using SELECTserver will not appear in this list.
• Feature String: Some products, such as the OpenFlow (i.e. water) products, provide feature levels that are treated like a separate license. All other products will display a blank Feature String value.
• Expires: If a product is permitted to run offline, the date shows the last day the product can run without signing into the CONNECTION Client again. After this date, a sign in is required.
• Reserved: A license can be locked to a machine for extended offline use. A Yes value means the product does not require a network connection to activate until the expiration date.
• Allowed Offline: By default, products will function for a limited time (i.e. usually 7 days) if a user is not signed in. This ensures that products are still accessible during a temporary network outage. However, administrators can disable this feature on a product basis as a preventative for unexpected usage. A No value means you must be signed into CONNECTION Client to use the product.
• Offline Access Until: If the "Allowed Offline" is set to on, the date indicates the last day the product is allowed to operate without logging in to the CONNECTION Client again. After this date, you must log in. Successful login to CONNECTION Client resets the offline access timer for the next 7 days.
• Alerting Setting: This field will show you whether license alerts are enabled or disabled for the application. The following values may appear here:
   Alert – The product checks for other active users of the same product before opening. A license alert will be displayed if a configurable threshold of active licenses is exceeded.
   Disabled – The product opens without checking for other active users.
• License Type: This field will show one of the following values:
   Commercial – The product is recognized and available for use on the organizational account.
   Trial – The product is not recognized on the organizational account and is utilizing a trial period defined by the product (usually 7 days) if still available.
   Evaluation – The product is utilizing a 30-day evaluation license assigned by an administrator.
• Access: This field shows whether the product is permitted. A number of values may appear here:
   Allowed – The product is permitted and is activated.
   Denied – The product is not permitted and will either open with limited functionality or not at all.
   Offline – The product is permitted but is not signed in.
• Username: This field shows the Bentley login associated with the product.

Checkout License Tab

Product licenses can be locked to the computer for extended use apart from an Internet connection. 

The top pane provides a list of licenses. Although it shows two rows by default, the window can be made taller by dragging the window handle in the lower right corner. Additionally, columns can be filtered by clicking the filter icon as shown below.

To check out a license:

1. Select it in the top pane.

2. Specify an expiration date using the calendar icon located along the right edge.

3. Select a valid version from the list or manually enter the four part version number corresponding to the version of your product.

4. Click the Checkout button.

The bottom pane displays a list of licenses locked to the computer.

To check in (return) a license:

To return a license prior to the expiration date, select it in the bottom pane, and click the Check-in button above.

Product Status Tab

More detailed information is displayed on the Product Status tab. The following information is displayed:

• Product: This is the name of the product using Subscription Entitlement Service. Products using SELECTserver will not appear in this list.
• Feature String: Some products, such as the OpenFlow (i.e. water) products, provide feature levels that are treated like a separate license. All other products will display a blank Feature String value.
• Last Version Started: The four-part version number of your Subscription Entitlement Service product will display here. Earlier versions using SELECTserver will not be displayed.
• Previous Status: The activation status of the product the last time it was opened will display here.
• Description: A more detailed description of the Previous Status will be displayed in this column.

Importing a License

Licenses can be checked out from the Entitlement Management site on behalf of a user and saved as a file. The Licensing Tool provides two options to import checked out license files: Import Policy File or Import Policy from Folder

Option 1: To import a file, select "Import Policy File..." from the File menu, and select either a .belic file or a zip archive containing .belic files (generated from a bulk checkout). If there are multiple .belic files in the zip file, the import will search for the current machine name in the .belic file names to decide which license file to import.

Option 2: To import from a folder, select "Import Policy Folder...: from the File menu. Use the browse dialog to choose the folder where the checked-out license files are stored. Again, if there are multiple .belic files in the fold, the import will search for the current machine name in the .belic file names to decide which license file to import. This folder does not need to be a local file system folder; it can be on a shared network drive.

After the import, a dialog will confirm whether the license file imported successfully. Click the Sync button on the Entitlements tab as shown below to refresh the list.

If successful, the product with the imported license will display "Yes" in the Reserved column.

*Please note: Versions of CONNECTION Client prior to 10.00.15.11 will not update the Entitlements list after clicking the Sync button if a user is not signed in. Imported licenses will still function. To resolve the display issue, upgrade CONNECTION Client.

Configuring Proxy Settings

Starting with CONNECTION Client 10.00.18.13, Subscription Entitlement Service products can now utilize system proxy settings as configured in the Internet Options control panel. However, proxy settings can be manually configured if necessary:

1. Select Options from the Tools menu.

2. For most users, ensure the "Use System Proxy Settings" radio button is selected on the Proxy Configuration tab that appears. For server or test environments where proxy settings must be manually configured, choose the "Use Custom Proxy Settings" radio button instead.

3. If specifying custom proxy settings, enter the computer name of the proxy server. If a port must be specified, append the server name with a colon (:) and the port number (i.e. ProxyServer:8080). To determine what proxy settings (if any) are in use, please refer to the following wiki, specifically the section titled "Determine whether a proxy server is in use."

Note: PAC files are not supported in custom proxy settings.  If you need to use a PAC file, please apply that in the System proxy settings.

4. If user authentication is required as well, select the second checkbox, and enter user credentials.

5. Click the Test Proxy Configuration link in the lower right to confirm proper configuration.

6. If the configuration test is successful, click the OK button to save changes.

Configuring Error Logging Settings

Subscription Entitlement Service provides diagnostic logging to assist with troubleshooting efforts. By default, the Bentley Licensing Tool maintains a detailed rolling log that is sufficient for most troubleshooting, but configuration options can optionally be configured using the following steps within the Bentley Licensing Tool:

1. Select Options from the Tools menu.

2. Click the Error Logging tab.

3. The Minimum Log Level shows the level of detail to capture. Trace is the default selection which captures all diagnostic information. Each selection below Trace captures less diagnostic information. Lower levels allow diagnostic information to be captured over a greater time span before the oldest diagnostic data is deleted.

4. Client Logging is disabled by default. Enable it to capture additional diagnostic information for each Subscription Entitlement Service application.

Refresh and Reset Policy

Refresh Policy and Reset Policy are available from the Tools menu.

Refresh is available in all versions of CONNECTION Client. This is for expired policies or when a new policy is needed manually (auto refreshed occurs every 4 hours).

Reset is available in CONNECTION Client 11.00.3.14 or newer. Resetting the policy will empty your entitlements tab and will force a new policy next time an application is used. This option is useful for license troubleshooting or for clearing old licenses.

Click the "Yes I am sure" button to proceed.

Manually Sending Logs

If products fail to send outstanding usage for an extended period of time, they may stop functioning until this usage is transmitted. To manually send the logs, select "Send Logs Now" from the Tools menu as shown in the following screenshot:

A message should appear in the upper right corner of the window indicating whether usage is sending and whether it was successful.

Gathering Diagnostic Logs

The following wiki explains how to gather diagnostic logs via the Bentley Log Collector.

Submitting Feedback and Feature Requests

CONNECTION Client 11.00.03.xx and later now incorporates a feedback portal for direct communication between users and licensing development. To access the Bentley Licensing Tool Feedback Portal, select Feedback from the Help menu.

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