Licensing
Syside checks for a license when it runs. This page explains the Free, Solo and Business plans and their license types, how license validation works, what changes when you run Syside in offline environment, and which agreement governs your use.
Plans and license types
Syside can be used under three plans, with Business split into Individual and Floating. Each maps to a license type. For current plan details, included features and pricing, see Syside plans.
Plan |
License type |
Issued to |
|---|---|---|
Free |
Free |
n/a |
Solo |
Subscription |
An individual, tied to their email, who bought the license through self-service on Sensmetry.com. |
Business (Individual) |
Subscription |
An individual, tied to their work email at an organization, under a signed agreement. Provides additional license key for CI/CD applications. Can support offline usage. |
Business (Floating) |
Floating Subscription |
A dedicated point of contact at an organization, under a signed agreement. See Floating licenses for how many people can use Syside at once. Provides additional license key for CI/CD applications. |
License keys issued for Academia users have the same features and terms as Solo.
How license validation works
Syside validates your license against our licensing server. It does this when it starts, and then periodically while it keeps running. On every check, the server confirms the license is valid, active, and within its term.
Each check also sends license management data to the server; see License management data for the full list of what is sent.
See How long is my license valid, and how do I check? to find your license’s expiration date.
Using Syside in offline environment
Syside can run on machines that cannot reach our licensing servers, using an offline license file. This suits air-gapped environments, strict proxies, or machines kept offline by policy. With a valid offline license file, Syside never contacts the licensing server.
Offline use is available on the Business plan for Individual licenses only. See Offline license for how to set it up.
Floating licenses
A floating license gives your organization shared access to Syside among multiple users: concurrent usage is capped at the number of floating licenses acquired.
Example. You hold 2 floating seats.
Alice starts Syside in the morning. One seat is in use, one free.
Bob starts Syside an hour later. Both seats are now in use.
Carol starts Syside while Alice and Bob are both working. There is no free seat, but there is no hard cut off for Carol or any impact to Alice and Bob. Carol uses Syside without any interruptions. Sensmetry licensing server flags as total concurrent usage cap has been reached at 3.
Alice finishes for the day and closes Syside. Her seat returns to the pool once Syside has stopped checking in, which takes up to 30 minutes. See how a seat is counted below.
At the start of next month, Sensmetry sends a license usage report for previous month to a designated point of contact with visible concurrent usage cap reached.
Seats are counted by concurrent use, not by how many people are named on the agreement. A team of ten can share two seats if no more than two of them work in Syside at the same time.
What if report indicates more usage than we have bought?
Hitting the concurrent usage cap is a sizing problem. If it happens often, contact us at sales@sensmetry.com and we will adjust the seat count on your Service Order.
How a seat is counted
A seat is a machine running Syside, not a person and not an individual process. Everything you run on one machine shares a single seat.
While Syside runs, it checks in with our licensing server every 30 minutes. A seat is therefore not released the moment you stop working: it stays counted until 30 minutes have passed without a check-in.
What that means in practice on one machine:
If you have the Syside VS Code extension open in VS Code, running Syside CLI commands or Python scripts alongside it does not take an additional seat.
With VS Code closed, a Syside CLI command or script does not take a new seat if it runs within 30 minutes of the last check-in. If the last check-in was more than 30 minutes ago, it starts a new one.
A CLI command or script that runs for more than 30 minutes keeps its seat for as long as it runs.
To release your seat and make it available to others, close VS Code and stop all CLI commands and scripts.
How long is my license valid, and how do I check?
Your license runs for the term you bought: monthly or yearly for Solo, or the term set out in your Service Order for Business.
What governs your use of Syside
Free: Syside Solo License Agreement, agreed by using the VS Code extension.
Solo and Solo free trial licenses: Syside Solo License Agreement, accepted at checkout.
Business trial licenses: the Syside Business Evaluation License Agreement.
Business: the Syside Subscription License Agreement signed with your organization, together with its Service Order.