License rejected after O/S change

Support License
#1

I changed O/S from OpenSuse to Fedora. The hostname remains the same (Lance-Desktop). But I keep getting this error:

Failed to download the license: License error: Activation code has already been assigned to a different host and can’t be activated on fedora. Please log in to your Duplicacy customer page to change the hostname associated with the license.

Do I need to change the hostname on both systems to “temporary” then change it back…or something silly like that?

Thanks,
Lance

#2

The web GUI thinks the host name is fedora. You just need to change the host name on https://duplicacy.com/licenses to this name.

#3

I have a suggestion on this. Hostname is confusing, the hostname shown on Duplicacy gui webpage is sometimes different from what shows on the system information. For example, what Duplicacy recognizes on my mac is the same with hostname command, however it’s some kind of abbrivation of my device name.

Why not generate some sort of “device id” (probably just MD5 of hostname) instead of letting user find “hostname” might not work?

#4

My $0.02.

IMO there should not be an identity check altogether, much less derived from a hostname, that can, and does change. If user paid for a license – user shall be able to use that license on any machine any time, with no extra steps. License can be checked against the server, using any metadata from the machine, for example, to prevent abuse or for monitoring, but this should not be mandatory or necessary in the first place, see next paragraph

I don’t think piracy is so rampant that it justifies all those measures in the first place. These licensing enforcement only hurt honest customers.

  • Trial version sometimes loses authorization and stops working (not the best first impression). There have been a number of posts on this
  • Sometimes license is “lost” and backup stops. That was also discussed.
  • Hostname changes, it shall not be a factor in licensing. User’s email address – can be.
  • License check adds unnecessary dependency on internet connection. To do backup from local machine to another local machine you don’t need internet connection. And yet, Duplicacy wants it, just because it thinks a user might be a thief.

In my opinion, all the license key shall do is display “thank you” in the About page. That’s it.

Honest users will pay. Dishonest users won’t – but they are in the minority. (and arguably, piracy helps sales in the long run, but let’s not get into that). Punishing all honest users with extra hurdles to slightly inconvenience a few dishonest ones makes no sense. Those dishonest ones would not have paid anyway. There is nothing to be gained.

That’s my opinion anyway.

2 Likes
Trial reset request
#5

Would be really nice if we could use the Web Gui on machines without direct Internet Connection.

#6

“Locks are meant to keep honest people honest”

1 Like
#7

I tend to agree with you on this as a consumer. Besides the cli core is free out there with its codes, people don’t want to pay need just very little efforts. I don’t see the point to keep monitoring machine-license binding in real time.

However, if Duplicacy insists on this, the method has to be improved. Hostname online checking has too many problems, I would suggest an activation code including some more stable hardware info. For exmple, a gpg signed text including the sha2 of MAC address, this works offline as well.