About Packaging Products
In FlexNet Operations, you define your products as a collection of features that can be licensed and ordered as a set. This process of defining your products is referred to as product packaging. The product packaging process is highly flexible and many of the steps are particular to the licensing technology and models you support. Please first read the getting-started section specific to your licensing technology and follow the exercises there before packaging your products.
Discussion of the product packaging process is divided into the following groups:
For a discussion of trial products and how to make products available on the End-User Portal’s Trial Registration page, see the subtopic, About Trial Products.
For a discussion of download package and download file concepts, see the subtopic, About Download Management: FlexNet Electronic Software Delivery Components.
Product Packaging Concepts
In FlexNet Operations, a product represents a unit that can be ordered and licensed. The product hierarchy is designed to enable modularity and re-use, and to minimize duplication:
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A feature represents a licensable capability defined in a software application, and is the basic building block for a product. An example of a feature would be the Add function in a calculator, or the Print function in a word processing program. |
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A feature bundle is an aggregation of features. Feature bundles are primarily of interest to Product Managers because they facilitate modularity and easy re-use of features across products. In FlexNet Operations, you map features to feature bundles, and then to products. |
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A product is packaged from individual features or feature bundles and is associated with one or more license models. One or more part numbers can be assigned to a product. |
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A suite is packaged from individual products that are functionally complementary, and is associated with one or more license models. One or more part numbers can be assigned to a suite. |
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A maintenance represents the rights to get updates and upgrades to a product. A maintenance can be related to one or more products. One or more part numbers can be assigned to a maintenance product. |
To help keep the number of product definitions as low as possible, values of many product attributes can be set at one of several times in the license lifecycle.
Note:Producers who use FlexNet Operations and FlexNet Electronic Software Delivery (requires the Software Delivery module) can also create download package, files, and agreements. For more information, see About Download Management and FlexNet Electronic Software Delivery.
Example Product Definition
Consider an application called Sample App 3000. Its features might include, for example:
The features of your program correspond to features expressed in your license rights as defined by product management. One common practice is to prefix feature names with the product name, as in:
Another common practice is to define a feature that represents the entire application, checking out this feature when the application initializes, and checking it back in when the application exits. Such a feature might be called SampleApp.primary.
Product Packaging Overview
Once you have created and deployed your license technology and license models, you can begin defining your products. Packaging a product is the process of creating a product definition that is used to create entitlements and to generate licenses. The product packaging process includes
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Creating one or more transaction keys (if you use any trusted license models) |
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Creating a product line (required for producers who use FlexNet Operations for software delivery) |
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Creating the hierarchy of features, feature bundles, products, and suites |
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Creating maintenance products |
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Associating license models (and transaction keys) with products and suites |
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Associating part numbers with products and suites (optional) |
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Relating products to other products, suites, or maintenance (optional) |
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Associating product lines with products and suites (optional) |
Also, in the interface, an optional, four-step product packaging wizard can lead you through creating features, features bundles, products, and suites. (See Product Packaging Wizard.) License models and optionally, part numbers and product lines, are associated with a product in the flow of the wizard, but they must be created outside the steps of the wizard. Creating maintenance products also occurs outside the steps of the wizard.
Before You Begin
Before you start the product packaging process, it is important that you deploy your license technology and at least one license model.
It is also valuable to carefully consider the best way to define and combine your features and products and the best way to license your products.
Please read the FlexNet Operations getting started section particular to your license technology before you package your products.
Product Packaging Wizard
The product packaging wizard is a four-step flow that walks users through pages for
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Adding feature bundles |
Each step in the product packaging wizard includes a number of sub-steps that are contained in an entity-specific sub-wizard. Even so, the product packaging wizard includes most, but not all, product packaging activities. Some license technology-specific or optional activities are not part of the wizard, but the pages for those activities can be accessed directly from the Products menu. For example, when the product lines feature is enabled, you can map your product to a product line as part of the product sub-wizard; creating the product lines, though, must be done separately by clicking Products > Product Lines and then following the instructions in Managing Product Lines.
The steps and all the tasks each step contains are shown at the bottom of the Package Products page.
Tip:To open the Package Products page, click Products > Products.
Move from one step to the other using the Next button at the bottom of each page.
See Also
About Trial Products
About Download Management: FlexNet Electronic Software Delivery Components