Convert to TIFF in Virtual Environment

In recent years, many companies have started to switch from physical computers to hosting their users in virtual environments. Whether you are hosting in the cloud or running virtual machines from your local servers, there are unique requirements when purchasing file conversion software for your virtual environment.

PEERNET’s family of TIFF, PDF and other image conversion software have been traditionally sold at different license levels based on the number of users at your company that need access to the software. For companies looking to install and license the software on physical computers there are End User licenses, which will active a single computer, or an Unlimited End User license, which will activate an unlimited number of computers.

For customers with hundreds of users, where licensing each individual computer would be tedious, PEERNET also offers a Pre-Authorized Open license model which allows for an unlimited number of licenses of the software to be installed at one company with no remote licensing required. Due to the pre-licensed nature of this software, it can also be distributed across your company in a software push, which is a common method of loading software in companies with hundreds of physical computers. Lastly, PEERNET also offers a specific license level designed for Terminal Server or Citrix Server environments as well as a Windows Service license for customers looking to use our file conversion software in a Windows Service, a scheduled task or any other automated process.

But which license level is best for your virtual environment?

Well, that depends on your answers to these 3 questions.

Are you virtualizing your environment locally or in the cloud?
Are you provisioning or cloning from a template or gold copy?
Do you re-load from a fresh copy each day or do you have roaming profiles for your users?

Hosting your Virtual Environment

There are two different methods of hosting a virtualized environment. The virtualized environment can either be hosted locally or hosted in the cloud. Some examples of services that offer cloud hosting virtual environments include Amazon Web Services Cloud Hosting and Microsoft Azure Cloud Hosting.

In both hosting environments, local or in the cloud, you have the ability to virtualize machines or desktops. Virtualizing machines refers to creating virtual server environments. This includes virtualizing Terminal Server or Citrix Server environments. Virtualizing desktops refers to creating a virtual Windows 10 environment, for example, for each of your employees. Services such as Zenware and VMware Horizon are commonly used to create these virtualized desktop environments.

Regardless of how your company has chosen to implement a virtualized environment, you first need to determine your answers to the next two questions in order to determine the PEERNET license level that will best work in your environment.

Provisioning and Cloning

If you are hosting a virtualized environment, either locally or in the cloud, the TIFF converter license level you require is strongly dependent on whether or not you plan to clone your virtualized environment from a template. Cloning refers to when you have a base template for either a machine or desktop, sometimes referred to as the “gold copy”, and you copy that base template each time you need to create a new environment.

You can run virtual machines or virtual desktops without undertaking cloning or provisioning. In this situation, you would be able to license the virtual machine or virtual desktop without issues, as though it was a physical environment, and therefore you can purchase the license level of the PEERNET document conversion software based on the number of users that require access to the software.

If you are cloning desktops, you will require a Pre-Authorized Open license of your PEERNET file conversion software. This license level is required because in order to clone the user profile without running into barriers, you need a license level where no remote licensing is required. With the Pre-Authorized Open license level, the software comes pre-licensed. Therefore it can easily be installed on the base or gold copy and cloned out endlessly, without requiring the user to license the software using a serial number.

If you are cloning Terminal Server or Citrix Server machines, you will require a “Pre-Authorized Terminal Server” license, which is a custom build of our traditional Terminal Server license level. By eliminated the remote licensing requirement of our classic Terminal Server license, companies cloning their terminal servers from a gold copy will not run into any barriers created by the licensing process. This allows companies to spin multiple virtual terminal servers up or down for load balancing as needed. Pricing for this license level is based on the number of terminal servers you require; please contact PEERNET for more information.

Roaming Profiles

If you are virtualizing desktops locally or in the cloud, it is important to consider whether you allow for roaming profiles or whether your user profiles re-load from a fresh copy each day. If there are roaming profiles for your users, meaning that some personal information is being stored on each user, it is possible to store a PEERNET license file. Therefore, you could choose to purchase the End User license or Unlimited End User license for a virtual desktop environment with roaming profiles. In this situation, the software would have to be installed and licensed using the serial number on each virtual desktop that requires a TIFF converter or PDF converter. The license information would be stored as part of the roaming profile, so that the next day, when the user logged into their account, it would still be running an activated copy of the file converter.

If your virtual desktop environment is configured so that it re-loads the user profile from a fresh copy each day, the conversion software would become unlicensed each time it re-loaded. In this scenario, you would be better served by a Pre-Authorized Open license, thereby avoiding any licensing requirements all together.

The best way to get started PEERNET’s file conversion software is by downloading our free 30-day trial. These are fully functional trials with a watermark added to all output files. As always, the PEERNET support team is more than happy to answer any of your questions and help you evaluate the trial.