How VisualSVN Server calculates the number of active users

Applies to: VisualSVN Server 4.0 and later

Starting from version 4.0, all VisualSVN Server licenses (Community, Essential and Enterprise) have a limit on the maximum number of users who can access the server. The number of active users is calculated differently for Subversion and Windows authentication modes — see below for more details.

For other information about licensing in VisualSVN Server, read the article KB220: VisualSVN Server 5.2 Licensing Overview.

Number of active users for Subversion authentication

When configured to use Subversion authentication, VisualSVN Server maintains its own list of Subversion user accounts. Accounts are listed under the Users element in the VisualSVN Server Manager console. The number of active users is equal to the total number of accounts excluding the suspended ones.

You can suspend a user by using the Suspend User context-menu command in the VisualSVN Server Manager console (the command is available starting from VisualSVN Server 4.1.0). Suspended users no longer count as active and have no access to the server.

Number of active users for Windows authentication

When your server is configured to use Windows authentication, the number of active users is equal to the total number of users that have accessed the server during the last 30 days. When a user accesses the server, VisualSVN Server remembers him as active for the next 30 days. After 30 days of inactivity, a user is no longer considered active.

Examining the list of active Windows users

To examine the list of currently active users when your server is using Windows authentication:

Start the VisualSVN Server Manager console.
Click Actions | Properties.
Click the Licensing tab.
Click the Details menu-button, then click Show active users details.

Tip

You can export the list of active users into a file. In the VisualSVN Server Active Users window, press Ctrl+C to copy the list of active users to the clipboard and paste it into a text file (e.g., using notepad.exe).

What happens when the number of active users exceeds the license size?

If the license size limit is accidentally exceeded, then:

There won't be any service interruptions for Subversion users. All Subversion users would still be able to perform both read and write operations without any errors or warnings. In other words, nothing is going to happen from the user's standpoint (on the client side).
There won't be any service interruptions with respect to the Multisite Repository Replication (VDFS) feature. All distributed repositories will continue to synchronize without any interruptions.

At the same time, there will be warnings on the VisualSVN Server Manager dashboard and in the VisualSVN Server event logs. The server instance that exceeds the user limit will also be restricted to installing newer versions and patch updates.

Using the "Cancel lease" command

Under some circumstances, you might want to manually remove a particular user from the list of active users. For example, if you have users who are not going to work with VisualSVN Server anymore and you would like to immediately reclaim a part of the per-user limit provided by your license. You can remove the particular user from this list by using the Cancel lease context menu command. To be able to use this command, you need to stop the VisualSVN Server services.