Virtualizing Oracle to Save on Licensing Costs

David Gallant, VMware, Inc.

Donnie Hamlett, iQuate

Daniel Hesselink, License Consulting

APP-BCA1751

#vmworldapps

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Disclaimer

This session may contain product features that are

currently under development.

This session/overview of the new technology represents

no commitment from VMware to deliver these features in

any generally available product.

Features are subject to change, and must not be included in

contracts, purchase orders, or sales agreements of any kind.

Technical feasibility and market demand will affect final delivery.

Pricing and packaging for any new technologies or features

discussed or presented have not been determined.

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Best Practices for Oracle Licensing

VIRTUALIZATION

Daniël Hesselink

License Consulting

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Story of a recent client

• Had virtualized Oracle, but didn’t think about ‘how’

• Oracle was expected to conduct an audit soon

• Within a week, License Consulting revealed a $14.8 Million license compliance issue

• Potential increase of annual Oracle support fee: >300%

• CFO insisted on research and resolution of the issue

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Subjects

Oracle LMS position towards virtualization

• Software Investment Guide

• Oracle Hard/Soft Partitioning Whitepaper

• Oracle’s response to complaining clients

Contractual position towards virtualization

• What’s in your contract

• How does it match with VMware’s whitepaper

Dealing with Oracle audits

• The wrong way

• The right way

Steps to get in control

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Position from Oracle LMS

Example: Oracle Database Enterprise Edition

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VMware cluster , 192 cores 6 servers • (Almost) Oracle dedicated VM

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• $4,560,000 License Cost

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Oracle Virtual Machine

Other Virtual Machine

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Position from Oracle LMS

Example: Oracle Database Enterprise Edition

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VMware cluster , 192 cores 6 servers • One Oracle VM with 2 Cores

• $4,560,000 License Cost

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Oracle Virtual Machine

Other Virtual Machine

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Software Investment Guide

Page 26 on the SIG (available at

http://www.oracle.com/us/corporate/pricing/software-

investment-guide/index.html)

Partitioning Servers

See the Partitioning document on http://www.oracle.com

/corporate/pricing/specialtopics.html for detailed information on

partitioning.

The footnote in Oracle’s Software Investment Guide:

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Oracle Hard/Soft Partitioning

Whitepaper

http://www.oracle.com/us/corporate/pricing/specialty-topics/index.html

“Soft partitioning is not permitted as a means to determine

or limit the number of software licenses required for a

given server.”

The footnote in Oracle’s Whitepaper:

The footnote in Oracle’s Partitioning Whitepaper:

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What do your contracts refer to?

• None of the (hundreds) OLSA’s we’ve seen contain any

wordings about Virtualization and/or Software Partitioning

• None of the OLSA’s contain any references to the Oracle

Software Investment Guide

• None of the OLSA’s contain any reference to Oracle’s

Hard/Soft partitioning whitepaper

• Oracle.com/contracts is mentioned in (newer) contracts, but

contains no information about virtualization at this time.

• The applicability of such a hyperlink in the contract

depends on your jurisdiction

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Oracle’s response to

customers

Customers send letters to Oracle Legal about this, arguing

• They did not know

• It’s not in any contractual agreement

Get the following reply from Oracle LMS (never from Oracle Legal):

"Our agreement is defined in the OLSA. Such a license agreement only

describes under what conditions you are allowed to use Oracle

software within your organization.

If a certain type of usage is not described in the agreement, it does not

mean that this type of use is therefore allowed".

Quote was freely translated from Dutch

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What lawyers think

“Leading Law Firm”

by Who’s Who Legal, commenting about Oracle

defending their SIG and Partitioning whitepaper:

‘Oracle’s whitepapers are not contract language, and the opinion

of LMS is not decisive. What applies, is the mutually agreed

contract and the meaning that both parties could have reasonably

attached thereto. If Oracle wants the whitepapers to apply, Oracle

should explicitly include them as part of the OLSA in a contractual

form, similar to Microsofts integration of the practices described in

the Product Use Rights (PUR) documents.’

Judica Krikke, sollicitor and ICT expert at

De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek, The Netherlands

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Contractual position towards

virtualization

OLSA (Oracle License and Services Agreement) typically states that

you must buy licenses in the quantities as defined in the applicable

license definition:

Processor: shall be defined as all processors where the Oracle

programs are installed and/or running.

It’s that simple

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VMware’s whitepaper

Written towards the simple fact that you must license the number of

Processors that Oracle can run on.

URL: http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/techpaper/vmw-understanding-

oracle-certification-supportlicensing-environments.pdf

• Explains how to limit the number of Processors where the Oracle

software can be running within a virtual farm

• Describes (correctly) the different approaches you could take

• All movements of VM’s can be logged and thus audited

• Audit scripts to are freely available

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Dealing with Oracle Audits

Oracle has the right to audit the use of Oracle software. A typical

Oracle agreement will state that:

• Oracle may not audit you more than once a year

• Oracle must announce the audit in writing with a 30 or 45 day

notice

• You agreed to provide reasonable assistance and information in

conducting such an audit

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Oracle audits: Manage it the

wrong way

Being unprepared will cost a lot of money

• You did not understand why what Oracle software is running

where

• Footprint-data shows historical use of Enterprise Edition

options and Management Packs that you don’t want to be

using

• You did not optimize your environment

• You did not agree/specify what information is considered to

be reasonable and relevant

• Your internal teams provide ‘any’ information to Oracle’s

auditors (not just ‘reasonable/relevant information)

Having just ‘some’ virtualized ‘somewhere’, will cost you $4.56

million.

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Example of irrelevant information:

vCenter screenshots

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Claim from Oracle LMS

Example:

Including 5 out of >20 Options/Packs used at one or more VM’s

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VMware cluster , 192 cores 6 servers $4,560,000 Database

$47,500 per Processor

One or more VM’s used:

•Partitioning ($11,500)

•Tuning Pack ($5,000)

•Diagnostics Pack ($5,000)

•Advanced Security ($11,500)

•Advanced Compression ($11,500)

Total claim

Database: $4,560,000

Options: $3,312,000

Man. Packs: $960,000

GRAND TOTAL: $8,832,000 (excluding 22% annual support)

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Oracle audits: Manage it the

right way

• You made IT decisions (partially) because of your licensing

infrastructure and costs

• You are aware of hidden risks in footprints of your Oracle

infrastructure (and fixed them wherever needed)

• You pre-assessed your compliance situation prior to sending

information to Oracle

• You have an NDA in place in regard to script results

• You made Oracle liable for negative effects of Oracle’s scripts

• You agreed to what information is reasonable and relevant

• Screenshots from your VMotion console are irrelevant: Only

information about ‘installed and/or running’ is reasonable and

relevant (remember!)

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…end of our story

STEPS:

• In depth analysis of current infrastructure and usage / footprint

information

• Re-evaluation of the virtualized deployment

• Proposals of alternate strategies and their operational/financial

impact

• Implementation of desired scenario

RESULTS:

• The $14.8 million compliance issue was eliminated

• No negative impact on database availability, performance or

support

• Oracle auditors audited the client shortly afterwards, but were

unable to substantiate any compliance claim

• YES, the company still runs Oracle happily on VMware.

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Thank you for your time!

Daniel Hesselink

www.licenseconsulting.eu

www.licenseconsulting.nl

dhesselink@licenseconsulting.eu

VIRTUALIZING ORACLE TO SAVE

ON LICENSING COST

Donnie Hamlett Technology Specialist

donnie.hamlett@iquate.com

The Process and Tools

An Intro to iQuate

• iQuate has been working in the industry since 2002

• The world leader for discovery, inventory, and measurement

of complex networks and datacenters

• Our iQSonar tool was the 1st tool of its kind to verified by

Oracle LMS.

– This means that they will accept the output as accurate enough to be

used in a formal License review.

• Our iQSonar for Oracle automatically produces output in the

OSW (Oracle Server Worksheet) format needed to make a

declaration to Oracle.

“Are you into gambling?”

$ 4,560,000

“Are you into gambling?”

$ 4,560,000

Would You be Willing to Bet Your Job ?

• Exactly how many Oracle databases do you have?

• What Servers do those Oracle databases live on?

• How many cores does each of the Servers have?

• How many Oracle Servers are Physical Machines?

• How many Oracle Servers are Virtual Machines?

• If the Servers are VM’s, are they part of a Cluster?

• Are the Oracle VM’s using VMotion?

• What Enterprise Edition Options are being used?

• What Management Packs are in use?

Visibility & Layers of the Network

Physical Hardware

Virtual Hardware

Installed Software

Software Configuration

Cost/Value

Clustering Configuration

Visibility & Layers of the Network

Physical Hardware

Virtual Hardware

OS and Software Installed

Software Configuration

Cost/Value

Clustering Configuration

Options, Management Packs, Installed Apps, etc.

Oracle Database Version, Windows, Sun OS, Linux, AIX etc.

Active/Active, Active/Passive, etc.

Physical : Virtual relationships, CPU Affinity, etc.

Procs., Cores, Memory, etc.

NETWORK

The DIME Process

Discovery

Inventory

Measurement

Extensibility

The hard way or the easy way ?

Vs MANUAL AUDIT AUTOMATED AUDIT

BASED ON FAITH BASED ON FACTS Time consuming / Inaccurate / Inconsistent Fast / Accurate / Consistent

HIGH COST

HIGH RISK

LOWER COST

LOWER RISK

ONCE OFF

LOW # of SERVERS

REPEATABLE

HI # of SERVERS

Never bring a knife to a gunfight Oracle LMS has well defined repeatable process

Movie : The Untouchables , 1987 Paramount Pictures directed by Brian DePalma

Discovery

• Need to have an agentless tool that discovers Servers within

a defined IP range

– We do not want to negatively impact Server performance

– We do not want to change the configuration of the Server

– We do not want to miss a server because an agent couldn’t not be

installed

• iQuate’s, iQSonar product specializes in agentless discovery

Inventory

• Need to securely connect to the Server

– Security Credentials for each layer

• This provides detailed data

– The system has X Processors, and Y cores

– The system is using Oracle Enterprise Edition

– Oracle is running on a Virtual Machine

– Vmotion is being used

– There are a total of X databases on the server

– What Options are installed

Measurement

• The relationship between the physical, virtual, OS and

application layers

– Most automated tools require you to do this on your own, but

IQSonar does this for you.

• At this level we know

– How Oracle is Configured

– What Options are being used (not just installed)

– If the Oracle VM is part of a VMWARE Cluster

– How many processors and cores are in the VMWARE Cluster

– How many processes have Oracle installed, and or running

iQSonar: Oracle Instance Listing

1 Physical

Host Per DB Data

7 Virtual

iQSonar: Database instance information

Options: Installed or In-Use?

Options: Installed or in-use cont.. ?

Licensing Optimization

• Once you understand your Oracle estate looks like you can

optimize it

– Options Installed and in Use

– Consolidation

Allocation Analysis

Optimization

Cluster not Licensed for Oracle Ent.

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6 servers VMware cluster , 192 cores

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6 servers VMware cluster , 192 cores

Cluster Licensed for

Oracle Ent.

By simply migrating

License cost goes from

$ 4,560,000 to $0

This is

Just one

Cluster!

Movie : Rain Man, 1988, United Artist directed by Barry Levinson

The right tools and process stack the odds in your favor!!

Presenting the

TCO Calculator

Call to Action

• Oracle is a fantastic database

– You are using it because of the value

– Make sure you are getting the most value out of your licensing

• If you running Oracle then it makes sense to virtualize it

– Cost benefits are enormous

– Easier to Manage

– Easier to Scale

• Get help and do it the smart way

– The right People

– The right Tools

Virtualizing Oracle to Save on Licensing Costs

David Gallant, VMware, Inc.

Donnie Hamlett, iQuate

Daniel Hesselink, License Consulting

APP-BCA1751

#vmworldapps