PowerBuilder 2017 and newer are licensed on a non-perpetual basis. A non-perpetual license allows you to use the software for a specified subscription period.
The subscription fee is generally required each year that you plan to use the product (i.e. your license is not perpetual). Once a subscription expires,
- Your 2-tier desktop apps and REST APIs developed with PowerBuilder and reports developed with InfoMaker will continue to run;
- Your apps deployed to PowerServer (PB Edition) will cease to operate unless you purchased a perpetual license of PowerServer.
- You will no longer be able to use the PowerBuilder, SnapDevelop, or InfoMaker tool to view/edit your projects;
- Access to the Appeon products under that subscription will cease, and to resume access you will be required to purchase a new subscription at the then-current price.
- You would not have access to any new updates, bug fixes, or tech support.
The license administrator can assign licenses to registered user accounts by going to User Center > License Management > PowerBuilder IDE > Assign User. After a user account is assigned with a PowerBuilder license successfully, the user can use that account to log in and activate the product.
- Online License: the assigned user account will be validated, and the binding license will be activated by the Appeon license server immediately during the login process. Step-by-step directions.
- Offline License: please review the Offline Activation section on the Appeon License User Guide.
PowerBuilder allows users to log in to the IDE on one machine only at any particular time. If a user is unable to log out from the machine and needs to log into another PowerBuilder IDE with the same account, only the license administrator who assigned the license to the user has the right to log out that user on the Appeon website remotely.
The license administrator can log out the user by navigating to User Center > License Management > PowerBuilder IDE > Logout User and clicking Logout.
It will depend on what you are distributing to your customers. If you are deploying a 2-tier or REST API-enabled PowerBuilder client/server app (i.e. no PowerServer) and what you are distributing to your customers is the app itself (not the IDE) then there are no distribution costs.
If you plan to develop Desktop Cloud Apps with PowerServer then a perpetual license of PowerServer will be required. You can find PowerServer perpetual license pricing information here. If you are a software vendor, please contact our sales dept. so we can discuss OEM partner pricing and terms.
Appeon provides a new standalone compiler that can be installed independent of the PowerBuilder IDE. If you don’t require the use of the PowerBuilder IDE for your build machines then you will not need any additional subscriptions.
The new cloud-based license management system is an alternative option that is more convenient and flexible than generating traditional license files. It allows the license to follow the developer rather than be tied down to a specific machine. It is an excellent choice if you virtualize your environment, telecommute, switch between multiple machines, or are simply fed up dealing with license files.
You can follow the instructions to generate traditional license files as you have done in the past with PowerBuilder or InfoMaker. It will no longer be using the SySAM mechanism, but the idea is quite similar and no Internet access is required on the machine.