Licence

The licence key a self-hosted installation runs under, what a seat is, and where keys come from.

The key

An installation of Alba Ticket on your own servers runs under a licence, which arrives as a key: a block of text beginning ALBA1.. Administration, Licence shows who the licence is for, when it was issued, when it expires and how long that leaves, and the seats it has beside the seats in use. Paste a key into the box and press Save the key; a renewed or enlarged licence is a new key that replaces the old one. The key is checked on your own server and nothing is sent anywhere, so it works without internet access. A workspace on the hosted service needs no key and has no Licence page; it has Plan and billing instead.

Seats

A seat is a member who has logged in during the last 30 days. Customers, inactive accounts, imported accounts nobody has logged in to and members who have not logged in for a month take no seat, and projects and tickets are never counted. Nobody needs deactivating to stop counting: an account that is no longer used stops taking a seat by itself and keeps its history, and takes one again when its owner comes back. A licence covers everything Alba Ticket does, the helpdesk included: there is one product, and nothing is licensed separately.

An installation of ten members or fewer needs no licence at all and shows no licence notice: that is the free Community plan.

Notices

A licence never stops anyone working. Instead a notice appears under the header:

• for everyone, when an installation past the free size has no licence, when the licence has expired, or when it has more members than the licence has seats;
• for everyone, on a trial licence, saying that this is a trial and how many days it has left;
• for administrators only, in the 30 days before the licence expires, as a reminder to renew.

Buying and renewing

Keys come from the licence portal at albaticket.com/licenses, where you log in with your email address and no password. Buy a licence asks how many members your installation has and whether you pay in dollars or euros, prices the year in that currency, and takes payment by card or — which is how most companies buy software they run themselves — by an invoice with thirty-day terms. Nothing is issued until the money arrives; when it does, the key is emailed to you and appears in the portal.

A licence bought by card renews by itself each year and says so in the portal; one bought by invoice is renewed from Renew. Either way a paid year is added to whatever the licence has left, on the same licence rather than a second, and a new key replaces the old one. Cancelling stops the renewal and never shortens what you have already paid for. Payments lists every invoice with its number, what it came to and whether it is paid. A 30-day trial key, and any change you would rather ask a person about, are on the same pages.