From what I recall, SAS adds messages to the log when the licence is about to expire.
Now, in contrast, here's something that doesn't work. Approximately 18 years ago on a weekend, one of my colleagues called me in a panic, because, the hospital where he was placed was encountering random ABENDs on a system which ran patient care. To make a long story very short, I called the vendor and inquired about the random ABENDs (which showed up as 4nnn (User) LE ABENDs in IMS). The vendor said when that the licence key expires, the writes (but not reads) to an IMS DL/I Database randomly ABEND. I wasted an entire night on this. It could've easily been solved by the vendor adding a WTO saying that the bill hadn't been paid. On 2019-06-30 20:33, Clark Morris wrote: > [Default] On 30 Jun 2019 15:40:29 -0700, in bit.listserv.ibm-main > charl...@mcn.org (Charles Mills) wrote: > >> Okay, I am "dropping up one level" from my question about persistent WTO >> messages. The REAL question is "what would be the best way to tell a >> customer that their license is fairly close to expiration?" > The WTO would go to someone to low in the pecking order to make this > worthwhile. Also it is something they wouldn't know what to do with > it. I suggest a call home module that notifies the vendor a product > is actually installed and the date of installation. This would then > update an application that would notify the vendor's license > management department when the installation is up for renewal. This > notifies the people most interested in seeing the vendor gets paid. > They probably have a better idea of who needs to be notified than does > most of the IT staff. > > Clark Morris >> Please, may I ask that we not digress into whether license enforcement is a >> good idea. That's a valid discussion but it's not this thread. I'm a >> contractor on this and it's not my decision. I also happen to think that >> software vendors need to get paid and not every customer ponies up >> spontaneously. FWIW, there is no CPUID checking in the product, just certain >> usage restrictions and an expiration date. >> >> It's a batch product. It's not a huge big deal product, so there is no >> "CA-1" that is devoted to license management. >> >> What would be the best way to get the right peoples' attention to let them >> know that the license is fairly close to expiration? Let me tell you from >> experience three things that do not work well: >> >> - An I message in SYSPRINT with no elevated return code. Put simply, nobody >> notices or cares. (Until the product expires, and then all heck breaks >> loose.) >> - A W message in SYSPRINT with a return code of 4. All heck breaks loose at >> that point, because everyone seems to use JCL that checks for a zero return >> code, and you break their batch processes with a 4. You might as well return >> 16 as return 4. >> - Having vendor sales management keep track of whether a new license has >> been sent, and managing it that way. (1) "A license has been sent" is not >> the same thing as "someone actually installed the license"; and (2) not >> every sales person is a genius at getting paperwork right. >> >> I was considering some sort of WTO that would require manual attention -- or >> at least console automation simulated attention -- but that may not be a >> great possibility. >> >> So ... what have you seen that has worked well in your opinion? >> >> Thanks, >> Charles >> >> ---------------------------------------------------------------------- >> For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, >> send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, > send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN > . > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
