Compliance Reports
Software compliance reports provide a documented view of your licensing position — how many licenses you own versus how many installations exist across your network. These reports are essential for audit preparation, management reporting, and license renewal planning.
Reports are available from the Software Dashboard and the Licensing menu, and can be generated in PDF format for printing or sharing.
Software Licensing Compliance Summary
The Compliance Summary report provides a high-level view of every managed software product and its compliance status:
| Column | Description |
|---|---|
| Seats | Total license seats across all licenses for this product |
| Base Rights | Rights that do not depend on other rights to qualify (i.e., rights from direct license purchases) |
| Total Rights | Total rights available after upgrade/downgrade processing |
| Licensable Installed | Number of computers with this product installed that require a license |
| Assigned | Number of computers explicitly assigned to a license for this product |
| Computers Allocated | Rights allocated to computers to cover installations |
| Downgrade | Rights taken from this product to cover other products via downgrade rules |
| Unallocated | License rights not yet allocated to any computer |
| Used for Downgrades | Downgrades from other products used to cover this product's requirements |
| Remainder | Rights in excess of the number of installations (positive = over-licensed, negative = under-licensed) |
How to Read the Report
- Products with a positive Remainder are compliant or over-licensed — no immediate action needed
- Products with a negative Remainder are under-licensed — these require attention
- Products with zero Unallocated rights have all licenses in use — any new installations will create a shortfall
- Products where Assigned is much lower than Licensable Installed may benefit from explicit license assignment to identify which specific machines are covered
Software Licensing Detail Report
The Detail Report includes the same columns as the Compliance Summary but additionally lists which specific computers are using each software product. Use this report when:
- Preparing for a vendor audit — the auditor may want to see exactly which machines are running their software
- Identifying candidates for software removal — machines that have the software but do not need it
- Validating that the compliance summary numbers are correct by reviewing the underlying data
Variants
The reports come in a few variants depending on scope:
| Report | Scope |
|---|---|
| Software Licensing Summary Report | Standard summary across all products |
| Software Licensing Summary Report - Full | Same, with extended columns and metadata |
| Software Licensing Detail Report | Per-machine breakdown |
| Software Licensing Detail Report - Full | Per-machine with extended columns |
| Software Licensing Detail Report Assigned | Per-machine, restricted to explicitly-assigned machines |
| Software Licensing Compliance Report By Manufacturer - Full | Grouped by vendor |
| Software Licensing Compliance Detail Report By Manufacturer - Full | Per-machine, grouped by vendor |
For a typical management report, use the standard Summary. For audit preparation, use the Detail Report (or the By Manufacturer variant if the audit is vendor-specific).
Generating Reports
- Navigate to the Software Dashboard or the Licensing → Licensing Reports menu
- Select the report you want from the reports list
- Click to generate — the report opens as a PDF in a new browser tab
- Print or save as needed
For per-license reports (covering one specific license), the Software License Compliance Report action on a license record produces a PDF for that single license — useful for vendor-specific audit responses.
Tips
- Run Calculate Licensing Position before generating reports to ensure the data is current
- Generate the Compliance Summary monthly and share with IT management to demonstrate ongoing compliance
- Keep the Detail Report available for audit purposes — it provides the evidence behind the summary numbers
- If a product shows unexpected numbers, check the software product's title associations and license records
Related Reading
- The Licensing Position Query — the interactive view
- The Licenses Query — per-license register
- Daily Tasks: Audit Preparation — pre-audit playbook using these reports
- Software Catalog — managing the products that appear in reports