Oracle licensing

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Contents

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Introduction

Oracle database software can be very expensive or very cheap (even free), depending on what you buy/use:

  • Oracle Enterprise Edition is very expensive - and it should be: It is the most powerful database management system on the planet! [Note: The neutrality of this statement is disputed!]
  • Oracle Standard Edition costs about the same as Microsoft SQL Server. It can only be licensed on servers, or server clusters, that have a maximum capacity of 4 processor sockets.
  • Oracle Standard Editon One is less expensive than SQL Server. It may only be licensed on servers that have a maximum capacity of 2 processor sockets.
  • Oracle PE is very inexpensive, full-featured version of Oracle DB, but is restricted to one user per database (server, not instance, most likely). The license however allows a developer to use all of the features of the EE (with the exception of the Options and Management Packs).
  • Oracle Enterprise Manager (OEM) Database Control and Grid control is provided free of charge, however, the management packs needs to be licensed for the number of users or CPU's that you "monitor" with it.
  • Oracle Application Server (iAS) Standard Edition One may only be licensed on servers that have a maximum capacity of 2 processor cores.

A great comparison document showing what is included and what isn't for all of the editions of the Database is available at Oracle.com. See page 10 for the beginning of the comparison table.

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What is a license

A license is the "right to use" (RTU) the software and not the software itself. If you have a license, you can obtain a copy of the software through whatever means - order, download, use the CDs from your last project, etc.

Please note that Oracle doesn't use software keys. You can just install the software and use it. It is up to you and your consciences to license the software before using it.

Licenses are not tied to the product version. For example, an Enterprise Edition database license is equally valid for Oracle 9i, Oracle 10g or Oracle 11g. However, you are only entitled to new versions if you have a valid maintenance and support contract in place.

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Licensing Models

Oracle provides a summary of their licensing models in http://www.oracle.com/corporate/pricing/sig.pdf

The following licensing methods are available:

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Processor/CPU licensing

You pay per processor (CPU) you run the Oracle software on. Intel Hyperthreading technology that makes one core look like two counts as 2 processors for this purpose (see this document)

Multi-core processors are priced as (number of cores)*(multi-core factor) processors, where the multi-core factor is:

  • 0.25 for SUN's UltraSparc T1 processors
  • 0.50 for Intel and AMD processors
  • 0.75 for all other multi-core processors
  • 1.00 for single-core processors

For example, a SUN UltraSparc T1 system with 4 x eight-core processors will require 4*8*0.25 = 8 licenses. Similarly, an IBM AIX system with 4 x eight-core processors will require 4*8*0.75 = 24 licenses.

License requirements were updated in Dec 2005. Original document could be found by this URL: http://www.oracle.com/corporate/press/2005_dec/multicoreupdate_dec2005.html

As at February 13 2006, Oracle still did not recognise "soft partitioning" technologies such as VMWare and Microsoft Virtual Server when licensing by processor/CPU. Instead you must licence by the physical processor in the underlying hardware. (see http://www.oracle.com/corporate/pricing/partitioning.pdf) "hardware partitioning" technologies are recognised, but Oracle places some caveats on this also.

Oracle's licensing policies last updated in February 2008. Original document can be found here: http://www.oracle.com/corporate/pricing/databaselicensing.pdf

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Named User Plus Licensing

Pay per named user (not concurrent user!). You are required to adhere to the following Oracle user minimums:

  • Oracle Database Standard Edition ONE: 5 Named User Plus licenses
  • Oracle Database Standard Edition: 5 Named User Plus licenses
  • Oracle Database Enterprise Edition: 25 Named User Plus licenses per CPU
  • Oracle Application Server Standard Edition ONE: 5 Named User Plus licenses
  • All other Oracle Application Server products: 10 Named User Plus licenses per CPU
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Named User Licensing

Named User (NU) licensing limits the number of individuals authorized to use Oracle on the specified computer.

NU licensing is not available for new contracts anymore. Although, some customers may still maintain/renew their NU license agreements.

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Concurrent Device

Concurrent Device (CD) licenses were defined as the 'Maximum amount of input devices connecting to the designated system at any given point in time'.

For Oracle Database Enterprise Edition, a minimum of 8 Concurrent Device licenses per Processor applied.

This model is not available anymore. Although, some customers still maintain/renew their CD license agreements.

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Application Specific Full Use Licensing

An Application Specific Full Use (ASFU) license is a restricted type of license sold by a Solution Provider in conjunction with its third-party Application Package.

For example, you can buy a ASFU license from SAP AG to use Oracle with the SAP/R3 system. This license would then be application specific and cannot be used for anything else.

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Embedded Software License

An Embedded Software License (ESL) is a very restrictive license type available from Independant Software Vendors (ISVs) who embed Oracle technology into their product. An end-user may not even be aware that the software package contains Oracle technology and should not be able to access it directly as a developer or system administrator.

An example of this licensing model in use may be a Point of Sale system that requires a database to log transactions.

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Other Considerations

Note that the standard Oracle License and Services Agreement only allows use of Oracle software for internal business operations. Other uses, such as a hosting service or an ASP, will require an agreement that extends the usage rights to cover such scenarios.

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Buying Oracle Licenses

Oracle licenses can be obtained by speaking directly with Oracle, through an ISV (in the case of ESL or ASFU licenses), or by working with an Oracle Partner who understands the complexities of the licensing model and can typically negotiate a fair price for a company (i.e., www.ioresources.com).

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Oracle License and Support Compliance

Occasionally, situations arise where options in the Oracle technology or applications stack are being used that were not paid for, or where use my be extending beyond the scope of the contractual terms. Most of these cases are not intentional, but occur from lack of knowledge of the Oracle licensing scheme by staff and a failure of managers to regularly audit license usage.

Some cases are:

  • Having more users than what are licensed.
  • Having more CPU's than what are licensed.
  • Being licensed on a lower edition product even though a server's size would necessitate high end licenses (SE1 vs. SE vs. EE).
  • Having some licenses with active support and others where support has not been paid for.
  • Using options such as the Tuning and Diagnostics Packs that are part of GRID Control, but need a seperate license. Same goes for Partitioning, it is an extra cost!
  • Customizing and modification of E-Business Suite components may necessitate full use Oracle Application Server and Database licenses.
  • Having an unlicenced stand-by server, even when it is cold.

Typically, when your Oracle rep. gains knowledge of such a situation a company could face an audit by Oracle. It is highly advisable to conduct a yearly audit of servers with an individual who understands Oracle licensing, but does not work for Oracle. By doing this, an IT executive can determine if his company is under-licensed, decide if his business needs to use those extras, budget for it, and negotiate with Oracle for a good deal on the licenses needed. Otherwise, a company can get caught financially off-guard when an Oracle representative notices under-licensing situations in the normal course of conversation with IT staff and managers.

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License Advisory

As you can tell Oracle licensing is complex, if you are not sure about what to license you may be in need of some expert advice. Here are a list of partners who provide license advisory services:

  • I O Resources offers free advice from people who have worked in Oracle's Contracts and Sales divisions.
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License detection

This section lists some scripts that can be executed to see (some of) the components that should be licensed:

Number of users and CPU/Processors: 

select * from v$license;

Database edition installed: 

select banner from v$version where BANNER like '%Edition%';

Oracle Partitioning installed: 

select decode(count(*), 0, 'No', 'Yes')
  from dba_part_tables
 where owner not in ('SYSMAN', 'SH', 'SYS', 'SYSTEM') and rownum = 1;

Oracle Spatial installed: 

select decode(count(*), 0, 'No', 'Yes')
  from all_sdo_geom_metadata where rownum = 1;

Oracle RAC installed: 

select decode(count(*), 0, 'No', 'Yes')
  from v$active_instances where rownum <= 2;
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