Managing Your Omni Licenses

If you purchased OmniOutliner from us (Thanks!), you received an email from The Omni Group that contained your license info. This included the name you used to register OmniOutliner 4, along with a string of characters that make up the license key. You’ll need these two pieces of information to enter the license in OmniOutliner.

Note
If you purchased OmniOutliner 4 from the Mac App Store (Thanks!), you won’t have to worry about licenses. Your copy of OmniOutliner 4 is automatically licensed to you by Apple. If you ever need to update your copy, or re-install OmniOutliner, you can do that through the Mac App Store.

Adding a New License

To enter your license, follow these steps:

  1. From the menu bar, choose OmniOutliner ▸ Licenses to open the Licenses window.
  2. Click Add License. A sheet slides down from the License window’s titlebar.
  3. Switch to Mail (or some other email client you may be using) and find the email message that contains the license key for OmniOutliner 4.

    Tip
    You can quickly switch between apps on your Mac using OS X’s built-in app switcher: Command-Tab. To keep the app switcher open, hold down the Command key after pressing Tab.

    When you press Command-Tab, the app switcher pops up onscreen as a row of icons for the apps currently running on your Mac. Continue pressing Command-Tab until you find the app you need—in this case, Mail—and then let go of the Command key. You can also use Shift-Command-Tab to go backwards in the list of running apps, or you can use the Left Arrow or Right Arrow keys to go backwards or forwards, respectively.

  4. In the email message, you’ll need to locate the name used for the License Owner, and the License Key. Select the name next to License Owner, and choose Edit ▸ Copy (or use Command-C) to copy the name to the pasteboard.

    Note
    If you can’t copy and paste the information, you’ll have to type it in. Make sure you enter everything exactly as it appears in your license message, including the dashes.

  5. Press Command-Tab to switch from Mail back to OmniOutliner.
  6. In the Owner field, choose Edit ▸ Paste (or press Command-V) to paste the name you used to register OmniOutliner.
  7. Press Command-Tab to switch from OmniOutliner to Mail.
  8. In the email message from us, select the License Key, and choose Edit ▸ Copy (or use Command-C) to copy the license key to the pasteboard.
  9. Press Command-Tab to switch from Mail to OmniOutliner.
  10. Click in the License Key field, and choose Edit ▸ Paste (or use Command-V).

  11. The Type drop-down menu is grayed out by default, which limits the license type to Personal for the current user account on your Mac. However, your license key can also be used for another Type, Computer:

    • Personal: This type is for your personal use, and will only be available on this computer when you are logged in as the user who installed OmniOutliner. You can install this license on more than one computer, but only for your personal use. You should not use the software on two different computers at the same time with this kind of license. If a Personal license is available, the application will always use it.

    • Computer: You can configure your Mac to use this type, which permits any other user account on your Mac to use OmniOutliner. See Configuring OmniOutliner to Support the Computer License for details on how to do this.

  12. Click Save.

After clicking Save, the license key is verified, after which you’ll need to restart OmniOutliner to unlock any Pro features, if you’ve purchased OmniOutliner 4 Pro.

Can’t Locate the Email Containing Your License Key?

If at any time you lose the email message from us that contained your license information, you can quickly obtain that info by going to our Lost and Found page.

Just enter the email address you used to when you purchased OmniOutliner (or any other product from The Omni Group), and click Send Licenses. If our system recognizes the email address, our robots will send you an email message containing the license information you need. (See, not all robots are evil.)

And, as a reminder, you won’t have a license if you purchased OmniOutliner 4 from the Mac App Store. Just log into your Mac App Store account and go to Purchases to reinstall your previously purchased apps.

Purchasing a License

Let’s say that you downloaded OmniOutliner 4 from our website and put it to good use during the free 14-day trial. You made a bunch of outliney lists and even got started on character profiles for that book you’ve been wanting to write. Now that you’re totally hooked and smitten with OmniOutliner 4 Pro’s features, you’ve decided it’s time to purchase OmniOutliner 4 before your trial runs out.

You could purchase OmniOutliner 4 from the Mac App Store, or you can purchase a license key direct from us right from within OmniOutliner!

To purchase a license:

  1. Open OmniOutliner 4.
  2. From the menu bar, choose OmniOutliner ▸ Licenses to open the Licenses window.
  3. Click Buy Licenses.

After clicking the Buy Licenses button, you will find yourself magically transported (in your preferred web browser) to the Omni Store, where you can purchase a license for OmniOutliner 4. (Naturally, this only works if you have an Internet connection.)

Registering an Omni App Purchased Through Retail

If you purchased OmniOutliner from a retail location (such as an Apple Store), you should register it with us on our Product Registration page.

In the event that you lose your license key, registering your Omni app with us ensures that you can retrieve your license info from our Lost and Found page.

Configuring OmniOutliner to Support the Computer License

If there is more than one user account on your Mac, and you’d like everyone on your Mac to discover the awesomeness that is OmniOutliner, you’ll need to jump through a couple of hoops (thanks to Apple’s mandated app sandboxing for OS X 10.7 and above). To set up a Computer license, follow these steps:

  1. Quit OmniOutliner.
  2. Open a new Finder window.
  3. Switch the Finder’s view settings to Column, by choosing View ▸ as Columns (or use Command-3). This makes it easier for you to traverse the folder hierarchy on your Mac.
  4. Choose Go ▸ Computer.
  5. Choose your Mac’s hard drive (if you haven’t renamed it, it should be named Macintosh HD), and then traverse through the following folders:

    • Library

    • Application Support
  6. In the Application Support folder, create a new folder (choose File ▸ New Folder, or use Shift-Command-N) and name it Omni Group. You will need to enter your admin password to create a new folder at this level.
  7. In the Omni Group folder, create a new folder and name it Software Licenses.
  8. Open OmniOutliner again, and then choose OmniOutliner ▸ Licenses.
  9. Click Add License.

When you click Add License, you’ll notice that the Type drop-down menu is no longer grayed out, and the Computer option is available for selection. Now just enter the Owner and License Key information you received from us, click Save, and you should be set.

Removing a License

To remove a license:

  1. Choose OmniOutliner ▸ Licenses.
  2. In the Licenses window, select the license you want to remove.
  3. Click Delete License.
  4. An alert sheet appears, asking you to confirm that you really, really want to delete the license. If you are certain that you want to do this, click Delete. If you’ve changed your mind, click Cancel and then close the Licenses window.