There are, mainly, six oracle licensing models. It is good to know about these when you want to procure oracle licenses.
The six oracle licensing models are:
- Full Use license
- Application Specific Full Use license
- Embedded license
- Restricted licenses
- Proprietary Application Hosting
- License included with other Oracle products
Each of of these are described below:
Full Use (FU)
A full use license does not have any restrictions on
- Using the full functionality of the licensed program
- Can use the technology products as underlying infrastructure for multiple applications
NOTE: One very big mistake that I have seen with my customers is the following: They believe a full use license of the Database gives them the right to use the functionality offered by the Options and Management Packs. This is incorrect. The full use license of the database allows you to fully exploit & use the permitted features of the database as explained in Oracle’s licensing documents. The options and management packs are, with exceptions, are licensed at extra cost.
Application Specific Full Use (ASFU)
An application specific full use license (ASFU) is
- A full use license without restrictions on using the complete functionality of the licensed program
- Restricted to be used with the specific application it is licensed for.
This license is generally provided through Independent Software Vendors (ISV) who develop their applications using Oracle software as the underlying infrastructure. ISVs are given the right to sub-license the Oracle software to their customers.
The onus of compliance remains with the end-user.
Embedded License (ESL)
An Embedded License (ESL) is
- An Application Specific license with further restrictions
- The end-user does not have access to the licensed Oracle program
This license is provided through Independent Software Vendors ( ISVs ) who develop applications on Oracle technology and distribute it with the application. The end-user does not have access to the Oracle program and cannot install, configure, or tune it. These actions are restricted to the ISV.
The onus of compliance is with the ISV.
Restricted Use Licenses
Restricted use licenses can have multiple different types of restrictions that could range from use with an application, hosting a specific application, use on specific servers, use by a specific class of users or employees etc. There is literally no limit to the possible restrictions. These restrictions are dependent on the negotiation between the customer and Oracle.
I am describing a few common restricted license types here.
Proprietary Application Hosting
A Proprietary Application Hosting license is
- An Application specific license provided to ISVs who have developed the application on the Oracle Database or Middleware product and want to provide it as a ‘hosted’ service to their customers.
This kind of hosting license can have many more restrictions specially regarding limiting the access to the specific application, not installing it on the end-user premises etc.
NOTE: There are many blogs where two types of hosting licenses are described – Proprietary and Generic. It is important to note that, in the current documents available at Oracle’s websites, only Proprietary Hosting is discussed and described.
Licenses Included with Oracle products
Products like E-Business Suite and many other applications have dependencies on different Oracle products. Oracle, in such situations, provides these products with restrictions on functionality or extent of usage.
As an example, and this is one of the most common compliance issues, is the provision of restricted licenses with E-Business Suite:
Oracle provides a restricted use license of the Oracle Database & WebLogic with E-Business Suite. The use of these licenses is subject to the customer NOT MAKING ANY CUSTOMIZATIONS.
If modifications are made you will need to purchase full use licenses of these programs.
The details of the kind of customizations are described in the chapter on Compliance issues in E-Business Suite.
These six oracle licensing models are the most common. Oracle also has a few models that are extremely rare and contracted for very specific purposes.
We provide one-time licenses assessments as well as Annual/Bi-Annual Assessment Services
You might want to read more about our CEO Sheshagiri Anegondi. He is one of the foremost Oracle license experts globally. You can contact him for a deeper understanding of Oracle licensing.
Java is another product of Oracle that is widely audited. In case you want to understand the key issues to be considered in choosing between Oracle and non-Oracle Java, you can click here.
