SOLO Server Product Configuration

In SOLO Server, a Product is defined to describe your application as a whole, and may contain one or many Product Options. For each type of license your application will support and require activation to use, at least one product option is defined. This example product is named "XYZ Product" with Product Options "One Year License" and "Perpetual License". Each Product Option can have different prices and activation settings:

To create your first Product, you can use the Add Product Wizard in SOLO Server.

1. Sign-in to SOLO Server. This can be done by clicking the "Log-in to SOLO Server" button or Tools / Log-in to SOLO Server menu option in Instant Protection PLUS 3, or by clicking on the SOLO Server Login link at the SoftwareKey.com website (for SOLO Server Shared URL authors).
2. Click the Configure / Products menu item then use the Actions dropdown and choose Add Product Wizard.

Create or select a Product...

1. Choose the option to Create a new Product.
2. Enter the Product Name (i.e. "XYZ Product" in our example). This is all that is required for now, you can add a description later.
3. Click the Continue button at the bottom.

Configure your new Option...

1. Choose to Define a new Option for the Product.
2. Choose the Type of Product and enter the Option Name. This is all that is required for now, you can add a description later.
3. Click the Continue button.

Configure your licensing settings...

1. Choose Instant Protection PLUS 3 as your licensing client and click Continue.
2. Select the Type of license you would like to use as well as any additional setting changes.
3. Click Continue.

Configure download settings...

1. You can add a File to Download (allowing users to download from SOLO Server) or enter a Download URL (for users to download from your website or other external location).
2. Select the Type of license you would like to use as well as any additional setting changes.
3. Click Continue.

Configure e-commerce settings...

1. Set the Price and Unit of Measure for your product.
2. Click Continue.

Configure miscellaneous settings...

1. Make any appropriate changes.
2. Click Continue.

Review and save

1. Look over your chosen settings.
2. When you are satisfied everything is correct, click Save.

View the SOLO Server manual for more information on adding a Product and Product Option in SOLO Server, and also view detailed information for each of the Product fields and Product Option fields. Most of the fields can be left at their default values.

It is possible to simply create additional product options the same way the first was created.  However, it is generally a good practice to copy existing product options to create your additional product options. It is strongly recommend to follow the steps below to create your additional product options:

1. Return to the product listing page if you are not already there. You can do this by clicking the Configure / Products menu item.
2. Click the Actions dropdown menu and select the Add Product Wizard.
3. Select Add new Option to an existing Product, select the Product, and then click Load and Continue at the bottom.
4. Select Define a new Option starting from a copy of all settings from an existing Option.
5. Select the Product that contains the Option you wish to copy, select the Option to Copy, and then click the Copy button.
6. Choose the Type of Product, enter a name for it, and then click the Continue button.
7. Make any appropriate changes to the licensing settings and click the Continue button.
8. Make any changes to the additional settings as necessary.
9. Once you get to the Review and save page, go over your chosen settings, and then click the Save button.

With everything configured as described in our example and steps above, the new Option will be added in your Product list/catalog.

The Trigger Code Seed , RegKey2 Seed and OffAct Key values from SOLO Server need to be synced up to your application, which is done though the Instant Protection PLUS 3 wizard. OffAct Key only applies to activations from another computer. If the seed values set in your application don't match what is in a given Product Option, then the license generated from the Product Option will not activate your software and will result in error 69 or 70. If you have multiple applications you are licensing, this lets you control which Product Options can activate a given application. A different Product and set of Product Options should have a different set of seed values.

These values in SOLO Server will be randomly generated when you create a new Product Option. Click "Re-Synchronize this product with SOLO Server" in the Instant Protection PLUS 3 wizard to sync the values for your current .ipp project.

When you create new Product Options in SOLO Server Server that should also be able to activate your application, make sure you use the same values as the Product Option you synched to. You can use the Duplicate option in SOLO Server to do this, which is a button at the top of the page. Note that you only have to sync to the seed values once in the Instant Protection PLUS 3 wizard.

The seed values of 400 and 123 are what we use for all of our samples, and we recommend that you do not use these same values for your applications.

When your application submits activation requests to SOLO Server, it can include the Product ID (189328 from the example above) in the request when you enable the "Validate the Product ID when activating online" option on the Activation Options step of the Instant Protection PLUS 3 wizard. By doing this, SOLO Server will ensure that the License ID the user entered for activation is the same as the Product ID that the application was synched to in the Instant Protection PLUS 3 wizard.  Since each Product ID is generally unique for each of your different applications, this validation prevents licenses issued for one product being used to activate a different product.

You may want to allow customers who have already activated your application to be able to install free updates that will use their existing license activation. You do not need to create a new product option for each new version, and you can choose whether a user with an activated license for a given application is required to also activate a newer version or not. Refer to the topic on Licensing Different Applications or Updated Versions for more information.

SOLO Server's Payment Plans allow you to offer subscription licenses, maintenance and support subscriptions, payment over multiple installments, and more. To learn more about how to configure SOLO Server for Payment Plans, please refer to the Automatic Recurring Subscriptions with SOLO Server tutorial.