Excel on a server (licensing Q)

I have a question about using Excel as part of an intranet application.
Specifically, my question is about the licensing implications of using Excel
in this way. (BTW this all applies to Excel 2003).

I have an intranet web application that allows people to submit their
timesheets. The web application puts the timesheet information in a
database.

I would like people to be able to submit the timesheets as Excel files. In
order to get the data out of the Excel files, I need to run Excel on the
server. I can accept the files through the web application and process them
asynchronously thereafter so I can avoid the (technical) problems associated
with having more than one instance of Excel running, etc.

[Note: there may be other ways of achieving the same result, but I'm really
interested more clarifying the licensing situation with this scenario.]

I will only ever have one instance of Excel running on the server, and it
will only ever be used for this purpose. All of the people using the
intranet web application already have Office 2003 on their desktops (which
of course is necessary so that they can create the Excel files in the first
place).

Here's the question: how should I license the copy of Excel on the server?

There's a Microsoft tech note at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/257757 that
describes the problems you may encounter running Excel on a server, and
gives advice on how to work around them. In the middle of that tech note, it
also mentions (almost as an aside):

"Besides the technical problems, you must also consider the feasibility of
such a design with respect to licensing. Current licensing guidelines
prevent Office Applications from being used on a server to service client
requests, unless those clients themselves have licensed copies of Office.
Using server-side Automation to provide Office functionality to unlicensed
workstations is not covered by the End User License Agreement (EULA)."

However, it does not define exactly what kind of licenses the "client
workstations" need, and nor does it say what kind of license is required for
the copy of Office on the server. Does the fact that Office is already
installed and licensed on all the user's desktops count?

The Office 2003 EULA talks about using Office on a server from a remote
machine, but it seems to deal mainly with the case where someone is actually
using the Office product as a desktop tool (e.g. using Terminal Services to
use Excel as though it was on their desktop). I doubt that the intention was
to prohibit the kind of use I have in mind. Here's what the EULA says:

"1.1 Installation and use. You may:
(a) install and use a copy of the Software on one personal computer or other
device; and
(b) install an additional copy of the Software on a second, portable device
for the exclusive use of the primary
user of the first copy of the Software.
1.2 Alternative Rights for Storage/Network Use. As an alternative to Section
1.1(a), you may install a copy of the
Software on a network storage device, such as a server computer, and allow
one access device, such as a personal
computer, to access and use that licensed copy of the Software over a
private network. You must obtain a license to the
Software for each additional device that accesses and uses the Software
installed on the network storage device, except
as permitted by Section 1.4 of this EULA."

So 1.2 seems to imply that I need "a license to use the software for each
additional device", which backs up what the tech note says. But again, it's
not explicit about whether "additional devices" with an existing licensed
version of Office qualify or not. (And as I say, I'm not even 100% sure that
this restriction would apply when the "additional devices" are not "using"
Office in the normal sense).

Can anyone clarify the situation?

DoNotSpamMe wrote:
I have a question about using Excel as part of an intranet application.
Specifically, my question is about the licensing implications of using Excel
in this way. (BTW this all applies to Excel 2003).

I have an intranet web application that allows people to submit their
timesheets. The web application puts the timesheet information in a
database.

I would like people to be able to submit the timesheets as Excel files. In
order to get the data out of the Excel files, I need to run Excel on the
server. I can accept the files through the web application and process them
asynchronously thereafter so I can avoid the (technical) problems associated
with having more than one instance of Excel running, etc.

[Note: there may be other ways of achieving the same result, but I'm really
interested more clarifying the licensing situation with this scenario.]

I will only ever have one instance of Excel running on the server, and it
will only ever be used for this purpose. All of the people using the
intranet web application already have Office 2003 on their desktops (which
of course is necessary so that they can create the Excel files in the first
place).

Here's the question: how should I license the copy of Excel on the server?

There's a Microsoft tech note at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/257757 that
describes the problems you may encounter running Excel on a server, and
gives advice on how to work around them. In the middle of that tech note, it
also mentions (almost as an aside):

"Besides the technical problems, you must also consider the feasibility of
such a design with respect to licensing. Current licensing guidelines
prevent Office Applications from being used on a server to service client
requests, unless those clients themselves have licensed copies of Office.
Using server-side Automation to provide Office functionality to unlicensed
workstations is not covered by the End User License Agreement (EULA)."

However, it does not define exactly what kind of licenses the "client
workstations" need, and nor does it say what kind of license is required for
the copy of Office on the server. Does the fact that Office is already
installed and licensed on all the user's desktops count?

The Office 2003 EULA talks about using Office on a server from a remote
machine, but it seems to deal mainly with the case where someone is actually
using the Office product as a desktop tool (e.g. using Terminal Services to
use Excel as though it was on their desktop). I doubt that the intention was
to prohibit the kind of use I have in mind. Here's what the EULA says:

"1.1 Installation and use. You may:
(a) install and use a copy of the Software on one personal computer or other
device; and
(b) install an additional copy of the Software on a second, portable device
for the exclusive use of the primary
user of the first copy of the Software.
1.2 Alternative Rights for Storage/Network Use. As an alternative to Section
1.1(a), you may install a copy of the
Software on a network storage device, such as a server computer, and allow
one access device, such as a personal
computer, to access and use that licensed copy of the Software over a
private network. You must obtain a license to the
Software for each additional device that accesses and uses the Software
installed on the network storage device, except
as permitted by Section 1.4 of this EULA."

So 1.2 seems to imply that I need "a license to use the software for each
additional device", which backs up what the tech note says. But again, it's
not explicit about whether "additional devices" with an existing licensed
version of Office qualify or not. (And as I say, I'm not even 100% sure that
this restriction would apply when the "additional devices" are not "using"
Office in the normal sense).

Can anyone clarify the situation?




Simple read is that it can be installed on the server but any
workstation that accesses it MUST have a license. If you were to sit
down at the server to use it then the installation on the server must
also be licensed. Which comes down to every workstion must have its own
license. So, if every workstation has its Office license you are covered.

I don't know how exactly to configure everything you're wanting to do
with Excel, but I do know that there are easier ways to track your
time. Check out any 'timesheet' (http://blog.tsheets.com/timesheet)
company online and you'll see what I mean.

Anyways, best of luck.


--
ajstallones

OK, thanks. Now suppose that some sub-contractors (not employed by my
company) want to post timesheets to the system across the wider internet. I
know who they are and can assign them individual log-ins, and I know that
they also have Office installed, though obviously I have no actual control
over that. How does that affect things?

"Bob I" wrote in message
...

Simple read is that it can be installed on the server but any workstation
that accesses it MUST have a license. If you were to sit down at the
server to use it then the installation on the server must also be
licensed. Which comes down to every workstion must have its own license.
So, if every workstation has its Office license you are covered.

"Post timesheets to the system". What does that mean? Excel is used to
open, edit and save Excel workbook files. If you copy a file to the
server, Excel is not even involved. Perhaps you want to review where and
how run the Excel program files actually fits into the picture. Also
please remember that this is a peer to peer user group and not anything
related to Microsoft licensing, so if you are actually planning to setup
something in terminal services, you should be checking it with them.

DoNotSpamMe wrote:
OK, thanks. Now suppose that some sub-contractors (not employed by my
company) want to post timesheets to the system across the wider internet. I
know who they are and can assign them individual log-ins, and I know that
they also have Office installed, though obviously I have no actual control
over that. How does that affect things?

"Bob I" wrote in message
...

Simple read is that it can be installed on the server but any workstation
that accesses it MUST have a license. If you were to sit down at the
server to use it then the installation on the server must also be
licensed. Which comes down to every workstion must have its own license.
So, if every workstation has its Office license you are covered.

"Bob I" wrote in message
...
"Post timesheets to the system". What does that mean? Excel is used to
open, edit and save Excel workbook files. If you copy a file to the
server, Excel is not even involved. Perhaps you want to review where and
how run the Excel program files actually fits into the picture. Also
please remember that this is a peer to peer user group and not anything
related to Microsoft licensing, so if you are actually planning to setup
something in terminal services, you should be checking it with them.

Sorry, I should have repeated some of my original post for context. People
upload the timesheet files to the server, and the server processes those
files by extracting the timesheet info. When the uploaded file is an Excel
file, then the server needs to start Excel in order to open it. So, Excel is
running on the server "on behalf of" the person uploading the file, even
though that person never "sees" Excel, and certainly can't interact with it
in the normal way. This is definitely NOT a terminal services scenario.

For 'official' answers on licensing questions you may want to contact the folks through http://microsoft.com/licensing

The note you mentioned relates more to folks working with Excel spreadsheets published to a website that would require them to use
Excel to manipulate the data, rather than an email/attachment, batch form submission where the data is created by others then sent
as a file then processed by someone receiving the file if I understand your scenario correctly.

You may also want to followup with the folks in the Excel discussion group through the links below for methods that have been used
for similar tasks.

=======
"DoNotSpamMe" wrote in message ...
OK, thanks. Now suppose that some sub-contractors (not employed by my
company) want to post timesheets to the system across the wider internet. I
know who they are and can assign them individual log-ins, and I know that
they also have Office installed, though obviously I have no actual control
over that. How does that affect things?
--
Please let us know if this has helped,

Bob Buckland ?:-)
MS Office System Products MVP

*Courtesy is not expensive and can pay big dividends

LINKS
A. Specific newsgroup/discussion group mentioned in this message:
news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.excel
or via browser:
http://microsoft.com/communities/new...t.public.excel

B. MS Office Community discussion/newsgroups via Web Browser
http://microsoft.com/office/communit...s/default.mspx
or
Microsoft hosted newsgroups via Outlook Express/newsreader
news://msnews.microsoft.com

"DoNotSpamMe" wrote...
....
[Note: there may be other ways of achieving the same result, . . .
....

There are, and they'd very likely be more robust than running
unattended Excel macros on a server.