Patent ID: 9342669
Filing Date: 2016-05-17
CPC Classification: G06F

Claim Text:
1. A method of licensing and identification of a virtual network appliance in a virtualized environment, a representation of the virtual network appliance being received at a client computer over a network as a virtual machine (VM) image instance within the virtualized environment, the method comprising: receiving, at a licensing server over the network from the client computer, a request for a license for the virtual network appliance, the request including identification information for the virtual network appliance, the identification information including a virtual media access control (MAC) address and a universally unique identifier (UUID) for the VM image instance received at the client computer; extracting, at the licensing server, the virtual MAC address and the UUID for the VM image instance from the identification information included in the request; selecting, at the licensing server, one or more portions of the UUID for the VM image instance; generating, at the licensing server, a VM identifier for the VM image instance from at least the virtual MAC address and the one or more selected portions of the UUID for the VM image instance; generating, at the licensing server, a virtual network appliance identifier for the virtual network appliance from at least the one or more selected portions of the UUID for the VM image instance; generating, at the licensing server, the license for the virtual network appliance, the license including license data, the generating of the license including embedding at least the VM identifier in the license data; and sending, from the licensing server over the network, the license and the virtual network appliance identifier to the client computer for licensing and identification of the virtual network appliance in the virtualized environment.