HP Asset Manager, the solution for your Oracle Compliance (full white paper)
Oracle is one of the top 3 publishers where enterprise companies invest their money today. The official price list for one Oracle Enterprise Edition processor license is today $47 500 (http://www.oracle.com/us/corporate/pricing/technol
… and Oracle license compliance is one of the most challenging to maintain
An Oracle compliance audit can quickly turn into a very expensive exercise. HP Asset Manager, with the Oracle SAM Best Practice package, gives you the tools and best practices to help avoid cold sweat.
White paper gives you a practical understanding of Oracle Licensing, as well as HP Asset Manager’s answers and ready to use solutions for being successful in Oracle compliance management. It finishes with an Oracle SAM tour in Asset Manager across the interface. With Asset Manager, you can achieve huge savings savings through license use optimization and decreased legal risk through crystal clear visibility on compliance.
Below are the challenges of Oracle Licensing
- A mix of licensing models
- Per CPU licensing ($47 000 per processor):
- Oracle Enterprise Edition: you license your server for its number of cores for Oracle databases Enterprise Edition. The number of points allocated to the server depends on the CPU type of the server, the Core factor table gives the official rule: http://www.oracle.com/jp/direct/processor-core-fac
tor-table-jp-168076-ja.pdf. The rule is the same for the Enterprise Edition options (Partitioning or RAC for instance). - Oracle Standard and Standard One editions: the rule is simpler: you just license your server for the number of CPUs. No factor to apply.
- Per Named user plus licensing ($950 per user):
You can choose to pay for the users that access directly or indirectly your Oracle Database instance. Multiplexing is taken into account: if an internal web applications accesses an Oracle database using a unique Oracle user (impersonation) and 35 users access this web application, you need 35 Named user plus licenses. The common metric is that if more than 50 users access an application, it is worth choosing the per CPU licensing. However, If 60 identified users use 10 applications that use Oracle, then, it is worth covering these 60 users by Named User Plus access licenses that will give them access to an unlimited number of Oracle applications.
- Differentiation between free test and development servers and (expensive) production servers
- Virtualization:
Oracle has a reputation for not being VMWare friendly: you need to license an Oracle server for all CPUs of the physical server whether, whether the Oracle instance runs on a virtual platform (with soft partitioning) or on a physical one. Oracle recognizes hard partitioning for decreasing the number of cores. Nothing like the IBM sub capacity or Microsoft SQL Server Enterprise Edition virtualization licensing. The Oracle rule on partitioning can be found on: http://www.oracle.com/us/corporate/pricing/partiti
HP Asset Manager provides a simple and out of the box solution to get a quick view on Oracle compliance.
The SAM Best Practice package: contains Oracle SAM best practices is updated every other month and free for HP Asset Manager SAM customers, it is available on the HP resources:
- SSO portal where all patches for Asset Manager are delivered (AM 5.2X and AM9.3X patches) http://support.openview.hp.com/selfsolve/patches
- On HP Live Network where best practices are available https://h20088.www2.hp.com/ (Asset Manager community / standard content).
This package contains
- Software compliance counters and Dashboards for the CPU license that use the Oracle core factors (Oracle DB, Oracle Options, WebLogic…)
- Workflows and scripts that pre-allocate the appropriate number of points to the server according to the Oracle Core Factor table. The pre-calculation scripts are regularly updated by HP to reflect the last rules.
- Crystal Reports on license expenses
- Oracle Contract samples
- Demo data, so that you understand how it works
Besides the package:
- To manage per Named User Plus and test & development servers
- You can categorize your servers in HP Asset Manager and make sure the SW counter will not count test or developments servers that will be clearly identified is you Asset Management database.
- You can associate your production servers either to Named User Plus licensing or CPU licensing. HP Asset Manager Software counters are intelligent and can be targeted to specific server groups (“scope of Application” of the Software counter)
- You can also manage you Named User plus users in aApplication services contracts that capture the user, the profile, start and end date for the authorization using Oracle. An approval workflow allows to give access to a new user to Oracle DB through the Named User plus licensing
- All Software Asset Management processes are supported by HP Asset Manager best of breeds Asset Management capabilities
- License life cycle Management: Procurement, Allocation, License Contract (terms and conditions) validation, Maintenance contracts renewal, Retirement if applies)
- Inventory Management: store all the information on applications, usage, related hosts’ configurations
- Users’ Entitlements Management: set the internal policies around what user is allowed to use what application. A good way to manage this is to use Applications Services contracts, where users will get approval for getting access to the application for a given period
- Software compliance
Want to know more?
AM generic SAM post: http://h30501.www3.hp.com/t5/IT-Asset-Management-B
Business White Paper: Managing Oracle Database entitlements with HP Asset Manager http://h20195.www2.hp.com/v2/GetPDF.aspx/4AA3-3865
Asset Manager Technical white paper: “Starting a Software Asset Management process with Asset Manager and DDMI” (customer access only) on http://support.openview.hp.com/selfsolve/documents, in the Asset Manager 9.30 white paper section or packaged with Asset Manager on C:\Program Files\HP\Asset Manager 9.30 en\doc\white_papers
How does Oracle Software Asset Management look like in HP Asset Manager?
HP Asset Manager supports all aspects of Software Asset Management (Contract management, License life cycle management, inventory management, software compliance management)
The SAM Best practice package will provide out of the box per CPU software counters will provide the SW compliancy according to the Oracle Core Factor Table.
You get a crystal clear visibility on where you over spend and where you are at legal risk.
You can drill down from the dashboards to understand the details on the software counter on cost center by cost center basis or even server by server
You will see the number of rights, number of entitlements, number of installations (or utilization points), number of un-sued installation (based on flexible usage metrics)…
The Oracle Server CPU software counters will exclude the servers managed under "Named User Plus" entitlement
The “Per Named User Plus” entitlements will be managed through an Application Service Contracts with start date end date, status and supported by a flexible validation workflow in Asset Manager.
The “Named User Plus” software counter will display the list of entitled users versus the procured Named User Plus licenses.
A maintenance renewal dashboard provides a pro-active view of the Oracle maintenances to renew in the 6 coming months.
HP Asset Manager mixes compliance and financial information to provide a cost for compliance information. It can also provide an additional level of analysis: what would be the cost for compliance if all installs used by not authorized users or unused applications were de-installed.
HP Asset Manager links compliance process with procurement / change requests: from any negative software counter, you can order new licenses (related to the counter) or request removal of an application (based on usage information for instance).
