Hi, how many user limits are there for the donation version!

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cxwlove

Hi, how many user limits are there for the donation version!
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cxwlove

I didn't find any hints, can you please tell me how many computers I can use at the same time, thanks
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cxwlove

I have donated
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xCSxXenon

As many as you want
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cxwlove

But what does it mean to require activation for promotion?
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Zenju

As many as you want xCSxXenon, 28 Jun 2023, 13:55
No.

The FreeFileSync Donation Edition is expected to be used by you and your friends. So please don't upload it to the internet or do something else not in this spirit.
https://freefilesync.org/faq.php#donation-edition
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cxwlove

Can we use more than 30 computers in our company at the same time?
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xCSxXenon

I guess it depends which question is being answered, OP asked two different things.
Hi, how many user limits are there for the donation version!
The FreeFileSync Donation Edition is expected to be used by you and your friends. So please don't upload it to the internet or do something else not in this spirit.
I didn't find any hints, can you please tell me how many computers I can use at the same time, thanks
You can use it on all of your personal computers that you have

Zenju, to clarify, is there a limit to how many of my computers I can activate on?
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xCSxXenon

Can we use more than 30 computers in our company at the same time? cxwlove, 28 Jun 2023, 14:44
FFS Donation Edition is not for commercial use
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Zenju

Zenju, to clarify, is there a limit to how many of my computers I can activate on? xCSxXenon, 28 Jun 2023, 14:47
If you're asking this question, you're apparently not intending to use the Donation Edition only on your "friends" computers.

FFS Donation Edition is not for commercial use xCSxXenon, 28 Jun 2023, 14:47
Exactly.
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xCSxXenon

Zenju, to clarify, is there a limit to how many of my computers I can activate on? xCSxXenon, 28 Jun 2023, 14:47
If you're asking this question, you're apparently not intending to use the Donation Edition only on your "friends" computers.
Zenju, 28 Jun 2023, 16:19
I don't think that's a fair assumption to make. When the question specifically inquires about my own computers, your assumption on its use-case is irrelevant. What if I own 5, 10, 20, more computers? At some point, either you become suspicious, the software is hardcoded to stop activating, or there is no limit. I'm just wondering what that number is, if there is one

LeoW

A suggestion for cxwlove:

How about you choose to do what you think would be a fair donation for 30 computers in a corporate environment? Considering they are going to be used at work as you say make a small donation that you think would be appropriate to cover licensing for 30 computers that you're using at work.

Obviously you see the value in the software and want to use it. You don't have to be extravagant or donate lots and lots of money just be fair. For example most businesses would be more than happy to pay a few dollars per seat for backup software. Free file sync is far less expensive with donations than purchasing a comparable $30 to $50 per license product from a corporation.

For a few bucks/seat you get a license in perpetuity! It's a great deal.

Donate whatever your conscience is good with regarding usage.
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Zenju

A suggestion for cxwlove:

How about you choose to do what you think would be a fair donation LeoW, 28 Jun 2023, 22:02
No.

FreeFileSync Donation Edition" which is allowed for private use only.
https://freefilesync.org/faq.php#commercial

LeoW

Zenju,

I've done a lot of testing personally to a variety of cloud drives and on different computers and operating systems and I fail to gain any real performance benefits that I can tell using the donation edition that I use.

To me, the donation edition doesn't add any benefits to using the product other than the fact that you're donating some money to the development of the project.

Financially, it seems to make sense to want to have corporate users use the donation edition more so than individuals.

Briefly, why do you not want income from corporate users? It seems obvious that you would want to collect donations.

I use a few programs for other purposes that are free to use for personal use and cost money for business use. That seems to be a model that makes more sense.
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Zenju

Briefly, why do you not want income from corporate users? It seems obvious that you would want to collect donations. LeoW, 30 Jun 2023, 04:02
In general corporate clients won't do "donations". Trying to service them would add a whole new can of worms in form of complexity, requirements, compliance, etc. that I'm not interested to deal with (at this time).

But even if they were willing to donate, it isn't fair to threat them like a regular user, and allow their 1000 employees to use FFS for a mere 1$.

Consequently I explicitly forbid corporate usage for the Donation Edition.

LeoW

Ahh, I see.
Never would have thought of that.
Thanks for the explanation.
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Zenju

It wasn't possible before, but now that FreeFileSync 13 has just released, there is finally a version that can be licensed and used by businesses: https://freefilesync.org/business
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wohlfelder

Looks like the /silent install feature is no longer available for the Donation Edition! Will this be restored in 13.1?

Otherwise, the only sensible strategy is to keep a safe copy of v12.5 for silent installation purposes over several family PCs and then rely on AutoUpdate thereafter...
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Zenju

I see "/silent" primarily as a business feature that is required for mass-installation. For private use, manual installation should be fine, and then use the auto-updater to keep current.
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wohlfelder

I can see that although it is definitely a feature loss. I use a long script to periodically re-image our family computers with as much as possible automated. So, as I say, my workaround will be to be use FFS 12.5 with the /silent switch and then allow AutoUpdate per machine.
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qu1gon

I can see that although it is definitely a feature loss. So, as I say, my workaround will be to be use FFS 12.5 with the /silent switch and then allow AutoUpdate per machine. wohlfelder, 12 Sep 2023, 16:22
@wohlfelder - bist du deutscher? Kann man sich hier nicht privat anschreiben?

I can only agree, and you don't get any help either, I opened a thread asking for version 12.5 to be made available but it wasn't even answered.
My mistake was to delete the 12.5 immediately and replace with the newly released 13 version. Now I stand there without my donations edition for which I had donated....
... obviously I should now pay 20 € every year, so that I can continue to use the "one" function (silent installation) ^^
Because updates are only available for one year ^^

Man can still make an intermediate version for private users with the silent installation and can then make a livetime license with unlimited updates for 20€, every year 10 € etc.. or 1€ monthly.
Or just implement it back into the donation version, that would be fairest for the private donors.