# Periodic Background Check Behavior

This section describes the behavior of the protected application for the following types of license issues:

>Behavior for Missing License

>Behavior for Expired License

## Behavior for Missing License

This topic describes how the protection settings Periodic background checks and Allow grace periods after failed license check affect the behavior of the protected application when the connection between the application and the protection key is lost (for example, if the Sentinel HL key is disconnected).

This description is relevant only when the Periodic background checks check box is selected.

If the License Manager detects that the protection key is missing when a background check is performed, a notification is displayed, and one or more of the following option buttons are provided (as explained afterward):

Button | Response by the application
--- | ---
Retry | The application checks for the presence of the protection key.
Abort (may also appear as Cancel) | The application is terminated. (Unsaved work may be lost.)
Ignore | The application resumes operation for the number of seconds specified by Periodic background checks. This provides the user with a grace period to save work-in-progress. At the end of the grace period, the License Manager checks again for the required protection key. If the protection key is not found, the application redisplays the missing license notification, providing the Retry, Abort, and Ignore buttons. The user can click Ignore to repeat this process up to the number of times specified by the Allow grace periods after failed license check parameter. (The number of remaining repeats is displayed in the notification.) If the protection key is still not found at that point, only the Retry and Abort buttons are provided.

The process described above is triggered when the license for a specific Feature is not found. If at any point during the process, the required license for the specific Feature is found, the counter for grace periods is reset to the original number of periods specified. As a result, the process can start over if a license is again not found.

The value assigned to Allow grace periods after failed license check determines which of the option buttons are displayed as described in the table that follows.

Value of "Allow grace periods after failed license check" | Option buttons provided in the notification
--- | ---
Check box is not selected | The message "License not found" is displayed. Only the OK button is provided to dismiss the message box and to check again for the protection key. No grace periods are provided. This is the legacy behavior. (Default value)
0 | Retry and Abort buttons are provided. No grace periods are provided.
1-254 | Retry, Abort, and Ignore buttons are provided. If all grace periods have been used, only Retry and Abort buttons are provided.
255 | Retry, Abort, and Ignore buttons are provided, with unlimited grace periods. (However, the notification is displayed at the end of each grace period.)

IMPORTANT For applications that may use the Execution Count license type and the Admin License Manager:

End users can configure the Admin License Manager session to time out after as little as 10 minutes of inactivity. If the background check interval is greater than the idle time-out interval and a time-out occurs, the background thread will re-login to the protection key. This could result in additional consumption of licenses for applications licensed with the Execution Count license type. Therefore, Thales recommends that you do one of the following:

>Set a time interval of less than 10 minutes for Periodic background checks in order to prevent the session from timing out.

>Take other precautions to ensure that the end user does not set the idle time-out interval to a value lower than or equal to the Periodic background checks interval.

## Behavior for Expired License

Only relevant when the license type for a Feature is Expiration Date and the Periodic background checks check box is selected.

This topic describes how the protection setting Periodic background checks affects an application whose expiration date passes while the application is active.

By default, the license expiration date of a Feature in a protected application is only checked when the application starts. If the license is valid at startup, the application is allowed to run even if the expiration date passes while the application is running.

You have the option to set an attribute called die_at_expiration in the scope input XML tags for the LoginScope function. When enabled, this attribute causes the license expiration date to be checked each time a periodic background check is performed. If the background check determines that the expiration date of the Feature has passed, the application displays a message and offers to search for a valid license.

For details on specifying the login scope, see Enable Custom Protection Key Login Scope check box.