The University has joined a number of software licensing programs. These licensing programs provide University members with the relevant software either free of charge or at a very low license fee. Note that each licensing program is an individual contract with the software vendor and hence the licensing terms can be very different:

1. Microsoft Campus Agreement – It provides a number of Microsoft software products for running on University-owned PCs or Macs. The licenses are paid collectively by the University on an annual basis. Products covered by this agreement include:
    
   
   • Microsoft Windows 7 Enterprise Edition upgrade – Please note that the PC must already have an existing Microsoft Windows license (e.g. Windows XP, Windows 7 Home Basic edition, etc.);
      
   • Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2010 – This includes Microsoft Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Outlook, One Note 2010, etc.
      
   • Microsoft Visual Studio
   
   Staff members can also install these products to one personally owned PC or Mac for University related activities;
    
2. Adobe Contractual License Program – This licensing program provides almost all Adobe software products (e.g. Adobe Acrobat Professional, Photoshop Pro, Design Suite, etc.) at very affordable fees;
    
3. SPSS – We have joined an SPSS licensing program organized by the Joint University Computer Center. Departments can subscribe to a list of SPSS products at very low fees. The annual license period starts on 1-June and ends on 31-May every year;
    
4. SAS – ITSC and SBM have jointly worked on a licensing program with SAS Hong Kong. With this program, University members can install and use a list of SAS software products;
    
5. Matlab – ITSC has licensed a number of Matlab network floating licenses for general causal users. These licenses can be used on any campus computer running Windows, Mac OS or Linux.  The  Matlab BASE license as well as a number of frequently used toolbox are covered.
    
   As the number of network licenses is limited, it is possible that one may not be able to check-out a license at one time and may need to try again later. In case of you need to use the Matlab software very often, we recommend you to acquire separate Matlab licenses to avoid license outage.

Please feel free to contact me (David.Shiu@ust.hk) if you have any further queries on these software licensing programs.