Renewal license for plugins - expiration behaviour in marketplace

[Oli S]

Following scenario:

• I have a plugin, working with the new UPM and is available in the Marketplace.
• A customer ordered one year ago a valid license with the new UPM
• this customer runs the plugin version version 1.0- At the 31. march does the license expired.
• At the 01. april an new version 1.1 of the plugin is built (builddate = 01. april) and uploaded to the marketplace.
• with a expired license, all functionality is working in the plugin (according to confluence - exept Testlicense)

Now my question:

• According to https://developer.atlassian.com/display/UPM/License+Validation+Rules the customer license isn't valid, and I could detect that the license isn't valid.
• Is the new plugin version offered to the customer via the UPM in confluence (he has no valid license anymore)
• Could he update the new version 1.1 via the UPM, or is this functionality disabled by the UPM, because the customer hasn't a valid lisence?
• Could I suppress, that a customer could install an invalid version (according to the lisence), so that he don't lose his working version or retrieve new ("unpaid") new functionality or compatibility.

Reason of my question:

• If my renewal license expires in confluence, I couldn't update anymore (I expect the same behaviours for plugins, but don't know if it's already there)
• If the customer updates from 1.0 to 1.1 is switching from a working sate to a non working state, because of the Version mismatch. (He doesn't know it before.) And there is no easy roll back if this happens.

I hope somebody have idea, how this works or give me the correct documentation link.

Best regards

oli

[BenW · Accepted solution]

Oli,

There are two workflows that can happen, depending on if this is an evaluation license or non-evaluation license.

Evaluation license: after the expiration date, the plugin will be expired and not function anymore. UPM will offer updates to newer versions because either way (with the current or newer versions), they won't work with the expired licenses.

Non-evaluation license: these licenses don't *expire*, but rather, they *maintenance-expire* meaning that the plugin can continue being used as is, but the user cannot receive support nor update to newer versions after the maintenance expiration date. UPM 2 will notify the user that there is an available update for the plugin but that it is incompatible with the installed license, and will recommend that the user acquire a new license first.

If the user ends up with a version that is incompatible with their license, they can always uninstall it and then install an older (compatible) version.

[Oli S]

Hi Ben,

We talked at the developer camp in wiesbaden :-) .

Thank you for your detailed answer, that's exact the information I needed.

Now it's clear.

thank you and greetings to san fransisco.

oli

[BenW]

One more thing - please make sure you are using a new-ish (2.2.4 or 2.3) version of the Plugin License Storage library. Relating to renew buttons not appearing when they should be, you may have run into https://ecosystem.atlassian.net/browse/UPM-1978.

[Oli S]

Thank you for the input, I use already the version 2.3.

[Martin Široký]

Thank you

[Martin Široký]

Hi Ben,

can I set real expiration (not only maintenence expiration) for my plugin somewhere - maybe in atlassian-plugin.xml? That means - plugin will fully work 12 months and then only some functionality will be available till user buy renewal license. Is this possible?

[BenW]

Hi M,

No - following the Marketplace model in place, purchased plugin licenses are always perpetual; twelve months after the purchase date, the plugin will still function properly but the user will no longer be able to update to newer versions or receive support. All Marketplace plugins should follow this model.

Cheers,
Ben

[Adam]

Is there an official statement on an FAQ or Developer website that states this? Just want to make sure this forum comment hasn't been superceded.

[BenW]

Yes: https://developer.atlassian.com/display/UPM/License+Validation+Rules

More specifically, look at the first two bullet points comparing evaluation and non-evaluation license scenarios.

[Evn]

Update to the link, looks like this is the new article: https://developer.atlassian.com/platform/marketplace/server-app-license-validation-rules/