Mac – Find the product key I entered for MS Office on Mac

office-for-macproduct-key

I have several legal license keys for Office:mac 2008. I want to do a quick audit of the two machines I've installed office on and verify which license keys are being used where. But I don't see the license key anywhere on the about dialog (or elsewhere).

I've seen other postings on the 'net directing me to look at various .plist files, but those only give me the "Product ID" which is different from the license key (which MS calls the "Product Key" on the little sticker).

Is there a way outside of calling MS to correlate the Product Key (which is required for installation and is the real license key) to the Product ID I see in the app itself?

Best Answer

It looks like the serial number is in the SetupInfo.plist file, but it's obfuscated in some way.

EDIT: The following comes from here:

Is there an easy way to do trial and error and change the key if it was already used?

If you look in the Application menu for the About item and display that, it will display the Product ID to you.

If you find two machines on which all but the last five digits match, the same key was used on those two machines.

It won't tell you "which" key was used, just that the "same" key was used.

Only trial and error will let you sort out which key belongs to which computer. You can change the licenses without removing and reinstalling however.

Easiest method: Launch the Remove Office tool and hold down Option at the first dialog, and the "remove office" option will change to "remove licensing information".

/Application/Microsoft Office 2008/Additional Tools/Remove Office

If you have the 3 systems connected, start one of the Office apps on the oldest of the bunch (IIRC the product keys are in a list so you probably used the top one on that system.). Then launch the same app on one of the other two. If there is a conflict modify the second one's product key. If not the 3rd one must be the odd man out - although you may still have to get 2 & 3 to bump heads in order to be certain.

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