Computer system providing virtual computing session license distribution features and related methods

A method comprising:

• communicating between a plurality of licensing servers arranged in a cluster and a license publishing server to obtain a given number of authorized licenses for virtual computing sessions associated with the cluster;
• in accordance with a consensus protocol,
• distributing the authorized licenses from the licensing server to a plurality of geographically distributed virtualization servers,
• reaching an agreement among the licensing servers regarding whether a number of authorized licenses in use across the virtualization servers has exceeded the given number of authorized licenses,
• ceasing to distribute authorized licenses to the virtualization servers based upon an agreement that the number of authorized licenses in use across the licensing servers has exceeded the given number of authorized licenses, and
• electing a leader licensing server from among the plurality of licensing servers to negotiate with the license publishing server to obtain the authorized licenses;
• running virtual computing sessions for client computing devices at the virtualization server based upon the authorized licenses;
• and
• sending a cluster membership change request from the leader licensing server to the license publishing server to change the cluster from a first configuration of licensing servers to a second configuration of licensing servers different than the first configuration, and entering a joint consensus of the licensing servers of the first configuration with the licensing servers of the second configuration in which a majority consensus of licensing servers from the first configuration and from the second configuration initiate the cluster membership change request.

A non-transitory computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for causing a licensing server to perform steps comprising:

• communicating with other licensing servers arranged in a cluster and a license publishing server to obtain a given number of authorized licenses from the license publishing server for virtual computing sessions run for client computing devices at a virtualization server based upon the authorized licenses;
• in accordance with a consensus protocol,
• distributing the authorized licenses along with the other licensing servers to a plurality of geographically distributed virtualization servers,
• reaching an agreement with the other licensing servers regarding whether a number of authorized licenses in use across the virtualization servers has exceeded the given number of authorized licenses,
• ceasing to distribute authorized licenses to the virtualization servers based upon an agreement that the number of authorized licenses in use across the licensing servers has exceeded the given number of authorized licenses, and
• cooperating with the other licensing servers to elect itself as a leader licensing server to negotiate with the license publishing server to obtain the authorized licenses;
• and
• sending a cluster membership change request to the license publishing server to change the cluster from a first configuration of licensing servers to a second configuration of licensing servers different than the first configuration;
• wherein the licensing servers of the first configuration enter a joint consensus with the licensing servers of the second configuration in which a majority consensus of licensing servers from the first configuration and from the second configuration initiate the cluster membership change request.