mg2x+@andrew.cmu.edu (Michael Andrew Gelman) (05/22/91)
My boss claims that he has heard of a set of programs that work as a distributed software server, one that allows better control over what is being used at any given time than the standard file server software. He thinks it is from Dartmouth college. Can anyone tell me if such a thing exists, and who to talk to about it? Yours Distributedly, Michael A. Gelman (mg2x@andrew.cmu.edu) "The Guy with the Cookie Monster" Programmer/Consultant -- Faculty Software Development Lab Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA #include <disclaimer.h>
ddaniel@lindy.Stanford.EDU (D. Daniel Sternbergh) (05/23/91)
In article <AcCeC6K00UzxI2KJsO@andrew.cmu.edu> mg2x+@andrew.cmu.edu (Michael Andrew Gelman) writes: >My boss claims that he has heard of a set of programs that work as a >distributed software server, one that allows better control over what is >being used at any given time than the standard file server software. He >thinks it is from Dartmouth college. >Can anyone tell me if such a thing exists, and who to talk to about it? The product is KeyServer, and it is available from Sassafras Software, a company whose association with Dartmouth is not clear to me. They can be reached at: Sassafras Software P.O. Box 150 Hanover, NH 03755 (603) 643-3351 or contact the developer directly: Denis Devlin denisd@dartmouth.edu bitnet: DDEVLIN@DARTCMS1.BITNET In short, the product allows the administrator to set how many copies of an application may be run concurrently over the network. On individual machines, when a user attempts to run an application, the application must first check out a key from the key server. If the maximum number of copies are already running, the server will notify the user and offer to queue them for the first available key. It looks great, and it is being run here at Stanford in the Medical School, from which I got the information (hi, lizzie!). My two questions, which I haven't gotten around to asking Denis yet, are (i) what can be done if my users still haven't gotten the hang of multifinder and are as likely to close all the windows and return to the Finder without ever quitting from the application (and thus tying up a key needlessly); (ii) although this seems compliant with the spirit of the licensing agreements, I haven't looked at them closely enough to know if any software vendors object to this set-up. I gather there was a recent review of software that does this sort of thing in MacWeek(?), judging from a letter from Denis I saw there. Does anyone know which issue and what it had to say? == Daniel == Daniel Sternbergh ddaniel@lindy.stanford.edu Local Network Administrator Materials Science & Engineering