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Ask HN: Developers who sell desktop software, what do you use for licensing?

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Re: Ask HN: Developers who sell desktop software, what do you use for licensing?

#21

Post by Fenaek »

danieltillett wrote: post #16

We use a layering of different systems (we choose ones that the crackers complain about) combined with our own in-house systems. It is mighty complex, but it lets us sell expensive software into the Chinese and Indian markets. What we would like is a truly different approach that is compatible with other licensing systems. It does not need to be perfect, just a pain to the crackers so that it adds another hurdle they…

Your answer doesn't help Tbh. You could as well say "we use something" and it would have given the same information.

Re: Ask HN: Developers who sell desktop software, what do you use for licensing?

#22

Post by danieltillett »

Fenaek wrote: post #21
danieltillett wrote: post #16

We use a layering of different systems (we choose ones that the crackers complain about) combined with our own in-house systems. It is mighty complex, but it lets us sell expensive software into the Chinese and Indian markets. What we would like is a truly different approach that is compatible with other licensing systems. It does not need to be perfect, just a pain to the crackers so that it adds another hurdle they…

Your answer doesn't help Tbh. You could as well say "we use something" and it would have given the same information.

The OP asked what features we were missing from our system and I answered. I assumed he is looking to make a new system and asked us what we would like.

While not security, obscuritiy is another layer of defence hence why I am reluctant to say what we use exactly.

Re: Ask HN: Developers who sell desktop software, what do you use for licensing?

#23

Post by jakobegger »

ezekg wrote: post #19
jakobegger wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no online activation, so customers can reuse license files as often as they want. That's why most customers don't bother buying additional licenses beyond the initial order, since it is a hassle to figure out how many licenses they are using. Most of my customers are individuals, so the problem isn't as bad as it sounds. I'm not sure building a complicated licensing system would be worthwhile; the potential…

Is there any particular reason you wouldn't use a service that provides this? Aren't you already vendor-locked to your payment provider, or is that not as tightly integrated? What if the service did on-premise/self-hosting?

I could walk away from Fastspring any day (I don't have subscriptions).

I guess the most important part is that everything would need to happen on my domains; there can't be any other people's domains in my code (eg update checking), that would make me too dependent.

I don't care about on-premise or self-hosting or cloud or whatever. I care about lock-in.

I plan to keep my company around for many years. At some point some of the services I use will go away or get too expensive or become crappy or whatever. That goes for web hosting, SVN hosting, mail server, payment provider, etc. That's why they need to be interchangeable.

I pay for services that add convenience; I don't pay for services that lock me in.

Re: Ask HN: Developers who sell desktop software, what do you use for licensing?

#24

Post by louisharwood »

Full Disclosure: I work for Paddle (https://paddle.com/)

Paddle take care of licensing, trials, payments and associated VAT/tax obligations through to analytics either through the web or a number of SDKs for Mac and Windows.

Worth checking out

Re: Ask HN: Developers who sell desktop software, what do you use for licensing?

#25

Post by ezekg »

jetti wrote: post #17
ezekg wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're one of the first developers I've talked to that actually implemented feature-licenses (modules, add-ons, etc.). That's something I'd love to know more about. How do you handle toggling features within the codebase? I'd imagine that you'd handle it kind of like you would with feature flags?

I'm going to preface this with the fact that it has been a couple years since I implemented this and so my memory may be a bit hazy but here we go... We sent XML that was signed with public/private keys and we just used XPath to figure out what modules were allowed. We would load the file into memory from disk on application start up and then would persist to disk any time they updated their license. We stored a bunc…

Thanks for the in-depth reply. I hope you don't mind, but I sent you an email with a few additional questions. (I used the email from your HN profile.)

I'm actually developing a licensing SaaS (in closed beta, currently), so I'd love to chat more if you have time.

Re: Ask HN: Developers who sell desktop software, what do you use for licensing?

#26

Post by ezekg »

danieltillett wrote: post #22
Fenaek wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your answer doesn't help Tbh. You could as well say "we use something" and it would have given the same information.

The OP asked what features we were missing from our system and I answered. I assumed he is looking to make a new system and asked us what we would like. While not security, obscuritiy is another layer of defence hence why I am reluctant to say what we use exactly.

I am indeed developing a licensing API (SaaS + on-prem options), so I appreciate the response either way.

Re: Ask HN: Developers who sell desktop software, what do you use for licensing?

#27

Post by ezekg »

TheMog wrote: post #2

A lot of the licensing systems I've encountered cause problems if you're selling to big corporations because they don't work well in locked down environments. Whatever you use needs to have an alternative way. The other question is the ease of integration and the cost of the software - if you spend weeks integrating and troubleshooting it, I'd be tempted to forego it for anything but a high-value product. Keep in min…

Good point. I'd imagine big corps would be more interested in an on-premise solution, rather than something that is hosted, e.g. SaaS.
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