Visual Studio licensing on build server

Question

_{Tuesday, August 28, 2018 8:34 AM}

Hi,

I'm using VSTS and want to setup private build servers. I have some servers on which I want to install Visual Studio 2017 Build Tools. I'll be using autoscaling, so sometimes we have 2 servers running and sometimes 10. My question is: how do I do the Visual Studio licensing on the build servers?

- do I need a license key for Visual Studio Build Tools?

- do I need to acquire a new key whenever a server starts?

- where do I acquire the key?

- how do I enter the key?

- am I entitled to a certain amount of keys through my VSTS account or through our existing users with MSDN (Visual Studio) licenses?

- I've just installed Visual Studio Build Tools and the builds just work. How is this possible without entering a key?

Many questions, but you would help me very much with providing answers.

Best regards,

Monne Onrust

All replies (6)

_{Friday, August 31, 2018 7:46 AM ✅Answered | 1 vote}

Hi Monne,

Thank you for your feedback.

Yes, you can install the VS professional or enterprise versions on those build servers if there have the corresponding licenses under your MSDN subscription account.

For the VS professional or enterprise version, it requires us to enter the license key after the installation, please check this doc: How to Unlock VS for more detail information.

If you have any other issues, please feel free to let us know.

BTW, if you think my reply is helpful, please mark it as answer and that will help other community members to easier search this information, thank you for your understanding.

Best regards,

Sara

MSDN Community Support Please remember to click "Mark as Answer" the responses that resolved your issue, and to click "Unmark as Answer" if not. This can be beneficial to other community members reading this thread. If you have any compliments or complaints to MSDN Support, feel free to contact [email protected]

_{Wednesday, August 29, 2018 8:52 AM | 1 vote}

Hi Monne Onrust,

Thank you for posting in MSDN forum!

As fa as I know, The Build Tools are licensed as a supplement to your existing Visual Studio license so there’s no extra cost to integrate them in your workflow. Thus, you just have a try to sign in your MSDN account in https://my.visualstudio.com/, check if your license is valid in your subscriptions.

when you download and install build tool successfully, you don’t need enter any key for it, just run it and you could build your application in development command prompt window.

In addition, if you have one or more licensed users of Visual Studio Enterprise Subscription, Visual Studio Professional with MSDN Subscription, or any Visual Studio cloud subscription then you may also install the Visual Studio software as part of Team Foundation Server 2017 Build Services. This way, you do not need to purchase a Visual Studio license to cover the running of Visual Studio on the build server for each person whose actions initiate a build.

More information, please refer to Visual Studio 2017 Licensing White Paper.

Best Regards,

Sara

MSDN Community Support Please remember to click "Mark as Answer" the responses that resolved your issue, and to click "Unmark as Answer" if not. This can be beneficial to other community members reading this thread. If you have any compliments or complaints to MSDN Support, feel free to contact [email protected]

_{Thursday, August 30, 2018 9:40 AM}

Hi Sara,

Thank you for your answer. That's what I was hoping for.

Still one uncertainty: we're using VSTS and are using private build servers. Can I install Visual Studio Professional or Enterprise on these build servers under the license of our existing users? And should I still enter a license key after installation or will it just run like the Build Tools?

Best regards,

Monne

_{Friday, August 31, 2018 9:59 AM}

Hi Sara,

Thank you very much. This was the information I was looking for!

Best regards,

Monne

_{Tuesday, May 7, 2019 3:43 PM | 2 votes}

Good morning
I have the same question with the 2 following differences:

1. each developper has his own "Microsoft Visual Studio Professional with MSDN" version 2019 (not 2017)
2. on the build servers, we don't build with TFS ; we build with Jenkins

=> do we need to purchase additonnal license for the build servers (and if yes which ones?) or not?

Thank you

Emmanuel

_{Thursday, October 3, 2019 12:16 PM | 2 votes}

I have nearly the same question:

Does someone need a separate Visual Studio license for the build server? No TFS used here!

Can the license from a developer be used (because "user" based)? Can it be the license from "Microsoft Visual Studio Professional" stand-alone edition? Or does it need to be a cloud/default subscription?

It would be nice to get an official document from Microsoft, where this condition written in black and White!