[KLUG Members] RE: software licensing

[Randall Perry]

If the MS stuff was licensed through OpenLicensing, you won't have the
CD's just the "certificate of authenticity" for a specific number of
clients.  The OS certificates since circa Win98SE have also come as tiny
(2" by 1") sticker applied to the box itself.  Most MS certificates are
normally green with a silver woven ribbon through the paper.  Newer
certificates have colors. If the certificate is stuck to a "manual"
(they are worthless, slim paperbacks on how great the MS is), rip the
front cover off with the certificate and throw the book away.  

I used to be PC Tech for a company that had ~150 PCs at that location.
We at first kept a large manilla envelope for each PC (labelled by
serial#).  In that pack we would put Motherboard manual, drivers, OS
license, Office License...etc.  Those packs got fat quickly and we
changed strategies when more than 100 PCs were there.  That's when we
took all certificates and grouped them together.  Stack the MS Win95
here.  MS Win98 here...  Then if you get audited, you are tracking X
number of licenses instead of machine by machine.  Especially when you
might have apps loaded at server this might make sense.  In an audit
they are just looking at whether you have enough certificates for the
number of active seats.  

Note:  If you had any upgrade packages, you must retain the license for
the original products as well.  For example, if the company ran Win3.x
years ago and then upgraded to Win95 and now to W2k, you have to have
the licenses from Win3.x, Uprade license for Win95 and Upgrade license
for w2k.

Randall Perry
www.domain-logic.com