Revisited: Oracle Database Licensing

Abstract:
Oracle licenses it's RDBMS by several factors, typically the Standard License (by socket) and an Enterprise License (by core scaling factor.) Occasionally, hardware and operating system vendors will enhance their offerings, requiring a revisit by database vendors to expand their legal categorizations for licensing. Oracle's guiding documents are readily available on-line.

Reason for Revisit:
A fairly extensive set of documents were posted over the past few years, but the URL's to these documents have changed, roughly since the acquisition of Sun by Oracle. Those core documents are listed below with why one might need to reference them.

Software Investment Guide
The Oracle Software Investment Guide is perhaps the most thorough document on performing Oracle installations within an organization. Perhaps these few sentences from the guide best describes what it contains.

We provide a detailed overview on how to license all Oracle products, from the Oracle database platform and application server to all Oracle enterprise applications, which includes Oracle E-Business Suite, Siebel, PeoplSoft, and JD Edwards.

Nine easy-to-read sections enable you to find the topics that interest you most. Within every section, each specific topic has hyperlinks and toll free numbers that enable you to get more information on the subject matter.

Additionally, we've included illustrations to enhance your understanding of our pricing practices related to data environments, batch processing, and more.

Pricing information on Oracle services, such as Support, Outsourcing, Consulting, and Education is also here.

This guide is clearly not isolated to merely Oracle Databases, but it is an authoritative source.

Database Licensing:
Oracle regularly updates their Database Licensing guideline document. Terminology such as Test, Production, Sockets, and Processors are defined within this document. Finer details which are often commonly asked questions include: development databases are normally no charge, but test and production databases must be purchased; Oracle Standard Editions may be charged by socket, but more advanced features means per-processor or per-user licensing must occur with Oracle Enterprise Edition; when dealing with IBM & Intel CPU's, "each chip in the multi-chip module is counted as one occupied socket."

Partitioning:
Oracle regularly updates their Server/Hardware Partitioning document, as system vendors create new technologies. Rigorous vendors create technologies categorized under "Hard Partitioning" (i.e. Capped Solaris Containers) while less rigorous vendors often create "Soft Partitioning" technologies (i.e. VMWare.) Some virtualization technology can be implemented as both Hard or Soft Partitioning, so implementation details must be attended to (i.e. Oracle VM implementation notes.) Costs can be controlled through careful architecture decisions, if one understands how a "Processor" is counted in such virtual environments.

Processor Core Factors:
Oracle regularly updates their Processor Core Factor Table, as new CPU designers release new central processor units. Certain multi-core CPU sockets with close throughput but vastly different core counts often have very different pricing (i.e. 16 core SPARC T3 "0.25" vs 8 core SPARC T4's "0.50" factor.)

Commercial Price List:
Oracle's standard Commercial Technology Price List which includes the database packages, is also published in PDF. While this price list changes regularly, Oracle specifies the retail pricing for databases such as: Standard Edition One, Standard Edition, Enterprise Edition, additional add-on components, etc.

In Conclusion:
It would be wise to track these changes to these documents, as new purchases are required, and new architectures are being developed.

Oracle License Change: Add SPARC T4

(Oracle SPARC T4 micrograph)

Oracle License Change: Add SPARC T4

Abstract

Oracle licenses it's RDBMS by several factors, typically the Standard License (by socket) and an Enterprise License (by core scaling factor.) Occasionally, Oracle will change the core scaling factor, resulting in discounting or liability for the consumer.

The Platform

The SPARC CPU from Oracle is an implementation of the SPARC V9 open specification. There have been several series of chips based upon this implementation: T1, T2, T2+, and T3. The T1 & T2 are both single socket implementations, while the T2+ and T3 are a multi-socket implementation. Oracle has released on their roadmap that the SPARC T4 processor will be coming out shortly.

The Addition

The SPARC T4 has been added to the Oracle RDBMS "Processor-Core Factor Table".

Factor Vendor/Processor
0.25 SUN UltraSPARC T1 <1.4GHz
0.25 Oracle SPARC T3
0.50 SUN UltraSPARC T1 1.4GHz
0.50 SUN UltraSPARC T2+ Multicore
0.50 Fujitsu SPARC VII+
0.50 Oracle SPARC T4
0.75 SUN UltraSPARC IV, IV+, or earlier
0.75 Fujitsu SPARC64 VI, VII
0.75 SUN UltraSPARC T2

Note, Green is new. Oracle has added the T4 processor with a core factor of 0.50.

Impacts to Network Management Infrastructure

It appears that Oracle will be releasing SPARC T4 into production. Purchasing should be watched very closely during this transition period.

If there is the need for increased thread performance, the 8 core T4 may be leveraged instead of the 16 core T3, with no impact to Oracle licensing when databases require an RDBMS.

The UltraSPARC IV+ 21.GHz processors had some of the best single-threaded performance characteristics of any SPARC processor ever produced (albeit, the throughput pales in comparison to any of the newer generation of multicore SPARC systems.)

The Oracle SPARC T4 finally looks like a good candidate to replace those old SUN UltraSPARC IV+ systems, which are so highly cherished for their single thread performance. There is probably no better Network Managment platform to consider at this point in time.

Licensing Agreements

Enough Said...

Sun / Oracle License Change - T2+ Discount!

Sun / Oracle License Change - T2+ Discount!

Abstract

Oracle licenses it's database by several factors, typically the Standard License (by socket) and an Enterprise License (by core scaling factor.) Occasionally, Oracle will change the core scaling factor, resulting in discounting or liability for the consumer.

The Platform

The OpenSPARC platform is an open sourced SPARC implementation where the specification is also open. There have been several series of chips based upon this implementation: T1, T2, and T2+. The T1 & T2 are both single socket implementations, while the T2+ is a multi-socket implementation.

The Discount

While reviewing the Oracle licensing PDF, the following information has come to light concerning the OpenSPARC processor line, in particular the Sun UltraSPARC T2+ processor.

Factor Vendor/Processor
0.25 SUN T1 1.0GHz and 1.2GHz (T1000, T2000)
0.50 SUN T1 1.4GHz (T2000)
0.50 Intel Xeon 74xx or 54xx multi-core series (or earlier); Intel Laptop
0.50 SUN UltraSPARC T2+ Multicore
0.75 SUN UltraSPARC T2 Multicore
0.75 SUN UltraSPARC IV, IV+, or earlier
0.75 SUN SPARC64 VI, VII
0.75 SUN UltraSPARC T2, T2+ Multicore
0.75 IBM POWER5
1.00 IBM POWER6, SystemZ
1.00 All Single Core Chips

Note, Red is old, Green is new. Oracle has broken out the T2+ processor to a core factor of 0.50 instead of 0.75.

To see a copy of some of the old license factors, please refer to my old blog on the Oracle IBM license change entry.

Impacts to Network Management infrastructure

To calculate your discount, see the table below. It is basically 33% for the Enterprise version of Oracle under the T2+ processor.

Chips Cores Old New
01 08 06 04
02 16 12 08
03 24 18 12
04 32 24 16

If you have been waiting for a good platform to move your polling intensive workloads to, this may be the right time, since the T2+ has had it's licensing liability reduced.

Oracle Licensing Update & Intel Conformance

Oracle Processor Licensing Change: Intel 5500 Series

In other blog postings (this, that), "Oracle Processor Core Factor Table" topped out on the 5400 series for the processor factor licensing discount of "0.5" with "All other multi-core chips" being tagged with a full price charge factor of "1.0".

With the release of the Intel 5500 series processors, the licensing had this new CPU family (with aggressively increased CPU throughput per core) had the factor falling under 1 processor charge per 1 core.

This had recently, and unceremoniously, changed. Oracle had provided this new quad-core 5500 series processors with the same "0.5" discount as the older multi-chip modules that Intel had been selling, for Oracle Enterprise Licensing.

See the bold-faced update below to the "Oracle Processor Core Factor Table"

Factor Vendor/Processor
0.50 Intel Xeon Series 74XX, Series 55XX or earlier Multicore chips

This is good news to the businesses which use Oracle Enterprise licenses, especially those businesses which hold a lot of data in databases, like Network Management businesses, where new data is acquired on 5, 10, 15, and 20 minute intervals on thousands of devices and stores for months.

Some Things Remain The Same: Intel Gets With The Program

This is the first real quad-core processor that Intel has produced, not using a multi-chip module - catching up to other vendors who have been in this space for years like Sun and more recently AMD.

While this does not sound like a significant change, in terms of existing Oracle licensing...

When licensing Oracle programs with Standard Edition One or Standard Edition in the product name, a processor is counted equivalent to a socket; however, in the case of multi-chip modules, each chip in the multi-chip module is counted as one occupied socket.

If applications in your Network Management Center are using Oracle Standard Edition licensing - this means businesses can upgrade hardware from older style Intel Multi-Chip Modules to the newer Single-Chip processors and get a significant increase in CPU capacity at the same license terms.

For example, comparing the licensing requirements in Oracle Standard Licensing for the newer single-chip Intel 5500 series against the multi-chip Intel 7400 series:

Series Cores Chips
7400 2 1
7400 4 2
7400 6 3
5500 4 1

In short, a (relatively new) single socket hex-core socket Intel 7400 platform (with 6 slow cores, being equivalent to an Oracle Standard Licensing 3 socket) can be replaced with a (brand new) quad-socket quad-core Intel 5500 platform (with 16 fast cores, being equivalent to an Oracle Standard Licensing 4 sockets.)

This may be a lot to absorb, but if you are using Oracle Standard Licensing on Intel, stay away from the old processors except in the smallest of configurations.

Cost Control: Oracle Database Licensing

Cost Control: Oracle Database Licensing

Oracle has a very interesting suite of software, which has traditionally been available across many platforms, and supported by a majority of enterprise software applications. The "Oracle Standard" license agreements offer significant cost savings for Oracle licensing costs, but there are significant restrictions that must be adhered to.

License Agreement Changes: March 16, 2009

The database license terms have changed end of Q1 2009 regarding POWER and non-listed multi-core CPU's, where core is considered a socket. Extracted below are the Intel x64, POWER, and SPARC processors on the Oracle Core Processor Table pdf...

Factor Vendor/Processor
0.25 SUN T1 1.0GHz and 1.2GHz (T1000, T2000)
0.50 SUN T1 1.4GHz (T2000)
0.50 Intel Xeon 74xx or 54xx multi-core series (or earlier); Intel Laptop
0.75 SUN UltraSPARC IV, IV+, or earlier
0.75 SUN SPARC64 VI, VII
0.75 SUN UltraSPARC T2, T2+ Multicore
0.75 IBM POWER5
1.00 IBM POWER6
1.00 IBM SystemZ
1.00 All Single Core Chips
1.00 All other Multi-Core Chips

When we read the March 16, 2009 database licensing pdf…

Database Metrics
The Oracle Standard Edition One, Standard Edition and Enterprise Editions of the database can be licensed using the Named User Plus metric or the Processor metric...

Named User Plus:
Standard Edition... The Real Applications Clusters option is not included with any Standard Edition versions prior to 10g. Customers who participate in Oracle's Update Subscription Service for the Standard Edition Database can upgrade to the 10g version of the product for the supported licenses. Also, Customers must use Oracle Cluster Ready Services as the clusterware; third party clusterware is not supported, AND Customers must use Oracle Automatic Storage Management to manage all data.

Processor: When licensing Oracle programs with Standard Edition One or Standard Edition in the product name, a processor is counted equivalent to a socket; however, in the case of multi-chip modules, each chip in the multi-chip module is counted as one occupied socket.

Cost Savings Opportunities

Perhaps the best opportunity to restrain costs is to leverage the "Standard Edition" licenses with the Processor metrics, rather than the "Enterprise Edition" licenses. The "Standard Edition" licenses can be used to leverage 2 and 4 socket platforms. If more capacity is needed, additional "Standard Edition" licenses can be leveraged with 10g, using clustering (keep in mind, a linear performance increase is not to be anticipated, with the additional overhead of SGA cache sync'ing over a slow inter-node interconnect.)

Cost Savings Caveats

While this seems like an excellent opportunity for cost savings and platform consolidation, this may not necessarily be the case, depending on the CPU architecture that was chosen. Note the clause on the Database Licensing pdf...

in the case of multi-chip modules, each chip in the multi-chip module is counted as one occupied socket

What is the implication to this?

The majority of multi-core CPU's on the market are all Multi-Chip Modules!

If you are running a POWER or Intel x64 multi-core processor, most of these chips would mean that the core must be counted as a socket.

Examples of Multi-Chip Modules (this is not exhautive) includes:

• Early Intel Dual-Core Pentium-D (where Intel glued 2 single core chips onto the same package)

• Early Intel Quad-Core MCM (where Intel glued 2 dual-core chips onto the same package)
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Core_2_Quad
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xeon#3200-series_.22Kentsfield.22
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xeon#3300-series_.22Yorkfield.22
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xeon#5300-series_.22Clovertown.22
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xeon#7300-series_.22Tigerton.22
  

• IBM POWER4 MCM (where IBM glued 4 POWER CPU's onto the same pacakge)

• IBM POWER5 MCM with four processors and four 36 MB external L3 cache dies on a ceramic multi-chip module

In effect, single socket quad core multi-chip modules would count as 4 socket machines in Oracle licensing terms.

If the business is trying to save money implementing Linux on Quad-Core processors, it it important to understand whether they are Multi-Chip Modules or not. If this is the case, then the business may need to resort to single socket systems, tied together in a grid, or choose a different CPU architecture that does not require Multi-Chip Modules like some modern SPARC processors.

Oracle is always the best place to go, in order to clarify some of these odd license stipulations.

Oracle Database License Change: IBM Punished

State of the Oracle Database Union

The Oracle Database Licensing has CHANGED, Effective Date: March 16, 2009!

The "Oracle Standard Edition One" and "Standard Edition" systems are charged on a "Per User Plus" basis, whichever is greater, on 2 sockets and 4 sockets respectively (the processor/cores option is not used) while the "Enterprise Edition" uses Named Users
http://www.oracle.com/corporate/pricing/databaselicensing.pdf

Named User Plus: This metric can be used in all environments. Different minimums apply depending on the Database edition:

• Standard Edition One requires a minimum of 5 Named User Plus licenses or the total number of actual users, whichever is greater. Oracle Standard Edition One may only be licensed on servers that have a maximum capacity of 2 sockets...

• Standard Edition requires a minimum of 5 Named User Plus licenses or the total number of actual users, whichever is greater. Oracle Database Standard Edition can only be licensed on servers that have a maximum capacity of 4 sockets… Effective with the release of 10g, the Oracle Database Standard Edition product includes the Real Applications Clusters database option…

• The Enterprise Edition requires a minimum of 25 Named User Plus per Processor licenses or the total number of actual users, whichever is greater.

Processor: This metric is used in environments where users cannot be identified and counted. The Internet is a typical environment where it is often difficult to count users. This metric can also be used when the Named User Plus population is very high and it is more cost effective for the customer to license the Database using the Processor metric. The Processor metric is not offered for Personal Edition. The number of required licenses shall be determined by multiplying the total number of cores of the processor by a core processor licensing factor specified on the Oracle Processor Core Factor Table which can be accessed at http://oracle.com/contracts

Licensing a multiplexing environment: If Oracle software is part of an environment in which multiplexing hardware or software, such as a TP monitor or a web server product, is used, then all users must be licensed at the multiplexing front end. Alternatively, the server on which the Oracle programs are installed and/or running may be licensed on a per Processor basis

In short, if you are licensing Oracle on one or a cluster of IBM systems running on (POWER5 or) POWER6 on platforms between 1-4 sockets AND you are paying for every user of the system (i.e. every help desk agent), then you are OK.

Is Your Business Exposed?

If you are licensing Oracle on one or a cluster of IBM systems running POWER6 (or IBM System Z mainframes) and not paying on a per-user basis (regardless of the number of sockets per server)… and paying licensing on a Processor basis (with a core multiplier factor), then the licensing factor change will impact you.

The following table holds the per-core or per-processor factor (extracted relevant CPU architectures for SUN & IBM.) The items in italics indicate a license change.
http://www.oracle.com/corporate/contracts/library/processor-core-factor-table.pdf

Factor Vendor/Processor
0.25 SUN T1 1.0GHz and 1.2GHz (T1000, T2000)
0.50 SUN T1 1.4GHz (T2000)
0.50 Intel Xeon 74xx or 54xx multi-core series (or earlier); Intel Laptop
0.75 SUN UltraSPARC IV, IV+, or earlier
0.75 SUN SPARC64 VI, VII
0.75 SUN UltraSPARC T2, T2+ Multicore
0.75 IBM POWER5
1.00 IBM POWER6, SystemZ
1.00 All Single Core Chips

Partitioning can help mitigate the cost factors in the licenses. Higher end Solaris platforms use SUN Dynamic Reconfiuration while lower end platforms can use SUN Solaris 10 Containers (capped) to help license mitigation. (i.e. if it is thought that you may be out of compliance on an internal SUN based system, you could move the Oracle Database into a Capped Solaris 10 Containier on the same platform) which has fewer processors available, while the rest of the processors could be available for the other application processes in another container.
http://www.oracle.com/corporate/pricing/partitioning.pdf

Hard partitioning
Hard partitioning physically segments a server, by taking a single large server and separating it into distinct smaller systems. Each separated system acts as a physically independent, self-contained server, typically with its own CPUs, operating system, separate boot area, memory, input/output subsystem and network resources.
Examples of such partitioning type include: Dynamic System Domains (DSD) -- enabled by Dynamic Reconfiguration (DR), Solaris 10 Containers (capped Containers only), LPAR (adds DLPAR with AIX 5.2), Micro-Partitions (capped partitions only), vPar, nPar...

You would need to determine if you are using the POWER6 of a SystemZ processor, to understand exposure. Because the multiplier has increased, hard partitioning (LPAR, DLPAR, vPar, nPar) will not be able to directly limit your exposure - unless you implement fewer cores, to reduce your total number of cores, since each core will cost you more. The loss of a core, to bring your budget in-line, will result in a serious loss in CPU power (due to the high thread speed for the core) for a measly 0.25 multiplier increase in cost. Implementing partitioning under AIX may cost you more in IBM license fees, as well as orphaning a core or two, which may not be able to be realistically recovered in another application.

Clear as mud, right?