#Get Started

To start using AvePoint Cense and ensure optimal functionality, you must complete the following configurations.

1. To enable AvePoint Cense to retrieve, monitor, and manage your Microsoft licenses, sign up to Cense via AvePoint Online Services and connect your Microsoft tenant. For details on signing up and tenant connection, refer to Sign Up for AvePoint Online Services and . To find out how AvePoint charges for licenses for AvePoint Cense, refer to Subscription and Licensing Information.

2. Add Cense users to AvePoint Online Services. Before launching the AvePoint Cense service to users in your organization, you must add the users as AvePoint Online Services users, assign the service licenses to them, and grant the application administrator or standard user role to each user. For details on how to add users, refer to .

3. To monitor your license usage and update license assignment, AvePoint Cense leverages app profile or service account authentication. Create the profiles in AvePoint Online Services before initializing Cense. For details on app and service account profile management, refer to Create App Profiles or Microsoft 365 Service Account Profiles. For the permissions required by the app or service account, refer to Required Permissions.

4. Create auto discovery scan profiles to scan your users and licenses. For the details, refer to Create Scan Profiles.

5. Finish initialization – When you access AvePoint Cense for the first time, there is an initialization wizard to assist you with the required configurations before using this product. You can finish the prerequisites, including and configuring the required or an optional . Then, decide whether you would like AvePoint Cense to report on mailbox usage information (such as mailbox size, archive status, etc.) and configure if you would like to receive an email notification after the synchronization is completed.

6. Manage Containers & Groups – When the , Microsoft 365 users can be scanned into various AvePoint Online Services containers based on different filter rules. In AvePoint Cense, the application administrator needs to create groups to include the user containers that standard users can manage. After the user container group was created, based on the permissions granted by the application administrator, standard users can select the user container groups they can manage and view the user license consumption, view license reports, and manage licenses of the selected groups.

7. Grant Permissions – After , application administrators will be automatically included in the Application administrator (built-in) permission group. Application administrators can create permission groups in AvePoint Cense and grant permissions to standard users so that they can use AvePoint Cense to view license consumption, view license reports, manage licenses, and manage license budgets.

8. Configure the Inactive User Alert – In Dashboard, the Attention required section can show the licenses used by inactive users. To view data in this section, the application administrator must configure the Inactive user alert.

9. Set License Unit Cost and License Budget – This is used for the calculation of license costs data both in Dashboard and in Reports. The configured budgets are also used for your cost control purposes, displaying data in the Dashboard > License budget monitor section.