Re: Controlling the number of users in the database

"DA Morgan" <damorgan_at_x.washington.edu> wrote in message news:1101193264.322878_at_yasure...
> Richard Kuhler wrote:
>
>>> They are vanishingly few in the current market. And even though it is
>>> possible ... the option to license by CPU or site also exists.
>>
>>
>> So? Maybe the posters company has a licensing option for unlimited users
>> as well. What does that have to do with the validity of having per user
>> licensing?
>
> Maybe. Poster didn't say and I don't like to read in things that were
> not said.
>
>>> Consumer based products such as those from Microsoft are a different
>>> issue.
>>
>> So if the posters product is a database centric word processor then
>> everything's fine? Why does it really matter? What are these black and
>> white distinctions you seem to see that I don't?
>
> Not as far as I'm concerned. I won't install anything on a production
> Oracle server where I have to account for this type of licensing.
>
> It would be a mistake for someone to now extend my remarks into some
> kind of fanatical extension that says no one should ever license this
> way under any circumstances with any product in any country. It is
> just a simple statement of fact that applies to me and those enterprises
> where I have decision making or advisory authority.

Well many ERP systems license on a per seat/per module basis. Presumably you'd recommend some other DBMS for them <g,d&r>.

I'm with Richard and the OP, per user licensing is a perfectly valid license model. It becomes rather more difficult to enforce than per processor when you take alternative access, or connection pooled access into account, but its still valid - especially for client server apps. I'd really like it if the EM management event system that Oracle supply were licensed per user of the event system, for example, rather than per processor of the monitored systems. Pricing management tools based on how many processors the monitored system hardware has seems entirely indefensible.

-- 
Niall Litchfield
Oracle DBA
http://www.niall.litchfield.dial.pipex.com