The iGoldMine licensing process can be somewhat baffling, and there are implications when you move the software to another server. This article will try and lift the fog a little.

iGoldMine, although a FrontRange product, is based on technology from a company called Graphon.

FrontRange will provide you with a product code which is used to obtain a licence file from Graphon. The process should happen automatically at the end of the installation process but can also be manually initiated by means of the getlicense.exe program in the “program files\frontrange\igoldmine\programs” directory.

The licence will be tied to one machine, and uses both the computer name and the MAC address of the network card that will handle the iGoldMine traffic. The licensing process will pick up the details of the machine on which it is being run, which makes life easy if you are running it on the iGoldMine server itself (at the end of the installation process for example), but these details can be over-ridden if you are running getlicense.exe on a different machine from the one that you wish to license.

The downloaded licence file has a .lic extension and will be found (or should be put) in the “program files\frontrange\igoldmine\programs” directory.

A service called the iGoldMine License Manager handles the authentication and allows iGoldMine to run. It produces a log file called License.log in the aforementioned programs directory.

If you move iGoldMine to another server then it will no longer run, and you will see an error in the license.log along the lines of “Wrong hostid on SERVER line for license file”. Running getlicense.exe won’t help in this instance, as it will just tell you that your serial number has already been redeemed. What you need to do is to submit a licence re-host request to Graphon:

http://www.graphon.com/customer-support/change-request-form

You will then be sent a new .lic file. It is always a good idea to put the old one (if one exists) somewhere safe before over-writing it!

Similarly if you upgrade your iGoldMine to a later version then, as long as you are currently on maintenance, you can use the same form to request a new licence.