Licensing and mulithreading

denzilsyb · Post by **denzilsyb** » Fri Jul 02, 2004 9:23 am

Hi guys

Heres the scenario.. Dell server 2650 that allows multithreading. Great! we have a DS7 installation that is licensed for two CPUs, which, on hardware level is what the Dell has - 2 CPUs (2 x 2.8 )

with multithreading, we will have 4 x 1.4. The problem as you can well imagine is that DS7 complains about the additional CPUs.

We eventually switched of multithreading to avoid the warnings and what-not.

Are we not penalising technology here? _Is_ licensing by CPU the best way to license DS, is number of developers not a better way? I am sure this has been debated many a time by Ascential, but for the developers out here/there - what is the justification? Is it just following market trends - i.e. "sounds like a good idea"?

I cant confirm this but I think Sun will have the ability to prohibit the OS from picking up what is happening with the CPUs, which will ruin the license by CPU strategy so many db vendors and Ascential are following.

...the reason to post this here I suppose is just to get some clarification from the people in the know, and some insight from the rest of the developers...

willpeng · Post by **willpeng** » Fri Jul 02, 2004 12:23 pm

Not an expert on licensing or multi-threading, but after an interesting interaction with Asc. about my company's licensing issue, I don't have an overall warm and fuzzy feeling toward Asc's licensing policy.

In my opinion, I don't think someone should charge me extra for using the more powerful hardware that I brought on the same software. For example, Music or Entertainment industry should not charge me extra on the same DVD just because I own a HDTV that can display better.

So in the case of licensing base on CPU, I feel the same way. The software is doing extra work not because of the software, but because of the hardware which I already pay for. And now I have to pay again to turn on the software which I already brought?

Question, when you said you turn off multi-treading, did you turn off the feature on DS or you turn the whole server's multi-treading function? Unless you have the box totally devoted to DS, I think it's kinda limiting if you have to turn off multi-treading on the whole box to satisfy DS. I should able to use other multi-treading programs even if DS are not licensed for Multi-treading.

denzilsyb · Post by **denzilsyb** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 1:23 am

Sorry to reply so late - was offline for a while.

I turned Multithreading off on the server. I am not aware that you can tell DS to ignore multithreading. The server is unfortunately not only devoted to DS, otherwise I wouldnt have an issue with it - but, as licensing would have it, the database that i am running on the server is also licensed like DS - multithreading is equal to more CPUs.

capitalism. you have too love it.

ray.wurlod · Post by **ray.wurlod** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 1:49 am

Until version 5.2, DataStage was licensed by project. .

Would you prefer that?

denzilsyb · Post by **denzilsyb** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 2:01 am

Ray - arent ozzies supposed to be in bed by now? :D

That could work - at least for projects I have been on so far, but what about developer licenses? It works like that now, _plus_ CPU licensing for the server. Or what about paying per version - i.e. version 5 costs this much, 7 that much and 8 will cost so much. Or it could be argued that you pay per plugin, but that I am sure will be a nightmare to manage on Ascentials side.

ray.wurlod · Post by **ray.wurlod** » Wed Jul 07, 2004 2:31 am

Some plug-ins are chargeable!

Mainly those for which Ascential must pay a licence fee of some kind, such as the SAP extract and BW Load plug-ins.

It's only 6:30pm on the east coast, 4:30pm in Perth (last stop before Jo'burg)!