We have a few different types of licenses. If you have one or two Macs, you will usually find that the Standard or Personal license is the most cost effective, even if you need to buy two or three to cover all of your users. However, if you have a larger network of five or more machines, the Concurrent Usage license is usually more cost effective.
Perpetual licenses
The following licenses are perpetual and will never expire. You can optionally renew maintenance after the first year to receive new releases. However, if you don’t renew maintenance you just remain on the last version that was current when your maintenance expire. Your license will never expire and you always have the option of upgrading your license in the future.
Personal License
A personal license is locked to a single Mac. This is a cost-effective solution for small labs or individuals who do not need to install MacVector on multiple machines. These are perpetual licenses and can be moved to a new machine at a future date as long as a maintenance contract is kept up to date for the license.
Standard License
This is the most common type of lab license. With a standard license, you are given a unique serial number along with a personalized activation code. You can install MacVector on as many machines as you like, but only one copy with that serial number can be running on a local network at one time. MacVector checks on startup and at periodical intervals to check that no other copies with the same serial number are running on the network. If a conflict is detected on startup, MacVector simply refuses to run and will tell you the user and machine name that is using the serial number. If a conflict is detected later (e.g. if you let a computer running MacVector go to sleep then wake it up later and another user is running the same serial number) you can save or print any open files but you cannot run any analyses.
Standard licenses can be installed on a home computer or on a laptop that you might take to conferences or to other labs. While disconnected from your local network you can continue to use MacVector without affecting usage installed on Macs back in the lab.
Concurrent Usage
Concurrent usage licenses give you a pool of licenses that can be shared across an entire network. The number of seats defines how many users can use the license concurrently. There are two options for Concurrent Usage licenses.
A ratio of one network license per 3-4 machines is usually sufficient to ensure that all users have access to MacVector when needed.
License server
For larger sites a license server is installed on a single server (Sassafras’s KeyServer) and each user’s Mac has a KeyClient application installed. KeyServer keeps track of the number of copies of MacVector currently in use on your network.
Each time a copy of MacVector is started, a license is checked out from the server. If all of the licenses in the pool are already checked out then additional users will get a message that there are no licenses available and will be asked if they wish to join a waiting list.
KeyServer has logging and adminstration tools that will give you insight into how many people are using your licenses.
Serverless network licenses
Serverless licenses do not have any of the extra administration and logging features that License Server gives you. However, they do not require a central server and they just work!
Roaming licenses
This is an add-on to Concurrent Usage licenses that allows temporary use of MacVector even when not connected to the central KeyServer. This extends the Concurrent Usage license to allow usage of MacVector at home, at a conference, or even on a plane with no Internet connection.
Annual or subscription licenses
Annual Standard Licenses
Annual Standard licenses are very similar to Standard Licenses except they are only valid for one year. You can install MacVector on as many machines as you like, but only one copy with that serial number can be running on a local network at one time.
Annual Personal Licenses
Annual Personal licenses are very similar to Standard Licenses except they are only valid for one year. They are locked to a single Mac.
Site licenses
These allow essentially unlimited usage throughout an Institution. These are only available as an Annual (yearly subscription) License. Contact Sales for more details.
Student and Postdoc licenses
We offer deeply discounted annual student and post-doc licenses to undergraduate and graduate students and post-doctoral fellows at accredited educational institutions.
Upgrades
If you have let your maintenance plan lapse, or have an older license of MacVector (any version), you can upgrade it. When you purchase an upgrade, you will be sent the latest version of MacVector, and will then be back on the maintenance plan. This means that you will be sent all new releases in the next 12 month period and be eligible for telephone and email support. We will send you a quotation the month before your yearly maintenance expires to give you the opportunity to renew.
MacVector Free
As the name implies, this can be used free of charge by anyone with a Macintosh computer capable of running MacVector. While this edition is primarily aimed at allowing anyone to read MacVector format files and save and print sequences in a variety of common formats, there is a surprising amount of editing and internet functionality included. This allows anyone to create gorgeous vector graphics of their annotated sequences and export them to other presentation programs.