Oracle E-Business Suite 12.2 can bring additional license ...cdn.instantmagazine.com/upload/3863/20170510_oracle_e...Oracle E-Business Suite can bring additional license requirements

Oracle E-Business Suite can bring additional license requirements for Oracle Middleware Author: Andra Tarata

This whitepaper is created to provide you an overview of the specific ins and outs you should be aware of regarding the proper licensing of Oracle Middleware programs in conjunction with the use of Oracle’s E-Business Suite programs.

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LICENSING ORACLE MIDDLEWARE IN CONJUNCTION WITH ORACLE E-BUSINESS SUITE

Contents Introduction .................................................................................................................................... 3Historical overview ......................................................................................................................... 4Insight into WebLogic Server Basic ............................................................................................... 5Features and restrictions of WebLogic Server Basic ..................................................................... 6Updates to WebLogic Server Basic License .................................................................................. 8Different modification levels for E-Business Suite applications ..................................................... 9License requirements for Oracle E-Business Suite – version 12.2 .............................................. 10Conclusion ................................................................................................................................... 12

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Introduction Oracle started as a database company. Since the introduction of Oracle E-Business Suite application software programs, it has always been the company’s strategy to gain a substantial share of the Enterprise Application software market.

To make Oracle E-Business Suite applications more competitive than those of other application software publishers (such as SAP), Oracle always granted its end users a so called “restricted use” right to make use of the underlying Oracle Database and Middleware software programs in its E-Business Suite licenses itself. This usage is restricted to the “out of the box” - unmodified - functionality of the E-Business Suite software. If users add or change columns, tables, stored procedures and/or triggers in the underlying Oracle Database programs, then Full Use licenses are required to be obtained for the underlying Database and Middleware programs.

By including the right to make use of the Database and Middleware programs in the Oracle E-Business Suite licenses itself, Oracle’s overall solution is considered to be less expensive than the application software programs of other publishers in which an end user would need to buy additional and separate licenses for the underlying Middleware and/or Database programs to run the application software on.

Think, for example, about the time when SAP did not have its own database platform (as it has today), what application do you think was more attractive to obtain? SAP, where you had to buy additional Database and/or Middleware licenses for, or Oracle, where you had everything included from the beginning?

But as said, the usage rights for the Oracle Database and Middleware programs as part of the Oracle E-Business Suite licenses have always been “restricted”. As such, these limitations should be understood in order to remain in control of your license compliance position. For more details on this topic, please see our whitepaper: Oracle E-Business Suite – The most common license compliance issues seen.

Now think, how does it work with Oracle’s WebLogic Server as the successor of Oracle’s original application server program called “Internet Application Server Enterprise Edition”, which was part of the Oracle E-Business Suite programs in the past, but which has now been replaced by Oracle WebLogic Server, since the acquisition of BEA Systems? This whitepaper is created to provide you an overview of the specific ins and outs you should be aware of regarding the proper licensing of Oracle Middleware programs in conjunction with the use of Oracle’s E-Business Suite programs.

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Historical overview In the period 1999 – 2008, Oracle included the restricted use right to utilize the following programs in all of its Oracle E-Business Suite licenses:

- Oracle Database Enterprise Edition - Oracle Internet Application Server Enterprise Edition - Oracle Programmer - Oracle Internet Developer Suite

These programs could be used without the need to license any of these programs separately, as long as they were used by the “out of the box” or better said unmodified E-Business Suite applications.

In April 2008, Oracle acquired BEA Systems. The focus of this acquisition was to add the more powerful application server programs “WebLogic” and “Tuxedo” to Oracle’s product portfolio. Since the completion of this acquisition and up to today, the further development and strategic direction of Oracle’s Application Server programs has been focused on the functionality of WebLogic Server.

Oracle WebLogic Server is therefore the main application server product that Oracle sells today and is available in three different editions with different functional capabilities, including:

- WebLogic Server Standard Edition - WebLogic Server Enterprise Edition - WebLogic Suite

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Insight into WebLogic Server Basic As of the acquisition date, Oracle incorporated the so called “WebLogic Server Basic” program into a number of its existing software programs, including: Oracle Internet Application Server Enterprise Edition, Oracle Forms and Reports, Oracle Business Intelligence Standard Edition and WebLogic Suite (as this includes a Full Use license of Internet Application Server Enterprise Edition).

WebLogic Server Basic is used only for running components provided within these Oracle programs and it can also be used for custom Java applications such as those developed for Oracle Containers for J2EE. Products outside of Oracle Internet Application Server and Oracle Forms and Reports that have licensing dependencies on any edition of Oracle Internet Application Server or Oracle Forms and Reports do not have the right to run those products on WebLogic Server Basic unless specifically stated within their licensing documentation.

The WebLogic Server Basic license includes usage rights, with the limitations summarized in the below table, to the following WebLogic Server features:

- Core WebLogic application server - Java Platform, Enterprise Edition (Java EE) - WebLogic Server management tools, including the Administration Console and WebLogic Scripting

Tool - WebLogic JDBC Drivers, WebLogic Server Clients, and WebLogic and Apache Web Server Plug-Ins - Basic JMS messaging, deployment, and high availability functionality - Transactional business logic with persistence with support of JPA and EJB - Basic WebLogic Server clustering support, including load balancing, failover, and cluster

management

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Features and restrictions of WebLogic Server Basic Below you'll find the main features and restrictions of the WebLogic Server Basic (as per Oracle’s program documentation available here):

Primary services WebLogic Server provides a number of services to assist with the construction of production architectures that are restricted, or that may not be used, in the WebLogic Server Basic license. These services fall into the following categories:

- High availability features, such as whole server migration, service migration, custom Work Managers, and overload management

- Deployment services and features, such as application versioning standalone deployment of JMS, JDBC, and WLDF modules; and FastSwap

- JMS messaging service features - Services such as the WebLogic Diagnostics Framework, WebLogic SNMP agents, and the WebLogic

Tuxedo Connector

WebLogic Web Services Use of the following WebLogic Web Services features is not permitted in the WebLogic Server Basic license:

- Buffered Web Services - Asynchronous Web Services - Conversational Web Services - JMS transport

Tooling Use of the following tooling features is not permitted in the WebLogic Server Basic license:

- Configuration Wizard, or the pack and unpack commands, for creating custom domains - Domain Template Builder, or the pack and unpack commands, for creating domain or domain

extension templates - Recording WebLogic Server Administration Console operations as a series of WebLogic Scripting Tool

(WLST) commands - Extending the WebLogic Server Administration Console

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APIs Use of the following APIs is not permitted in the WebLogic Server Basic license:

- Custom or CommonJ Work Manager usage outside the default WebLogic Server Work Manager - WebLogic JMS client for Microsoft .NET and C

Therefore, WebLogic Server Basic is a license-constrained version of WebLogic Server that is included in Oracle Internet Application Server Enterprise Edition, Oracle Forms and Reports, Oracle Business Intelligence Standard Edition and WebLogic Suite, as this includes a Full Use license of Internet Application Server Enterprise Edition and cannot be sold standalone.

Since all E-Business Suite application licenses come with a restricted-use license of Internet Application Server Enterprise Edition (which includes the right to make use of WebLogic Server Basic for use by E-Business Suite), end users don’t need to purchase a separate license of WebLogic to use it in conjunction with Oracle E-Business Suite applications. However, any modifications to the Oracle E-Business Suite itself do require Full Use licenses of Internet Application Server Enterprise Edition for the total number of Named User Plus or Processors for which these modifications are deployed.

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Updates to WebLogic Server Basic License Common modifications to the Oracle Application Server include the creation or modification of reports, forms and/or workbooks. In addition, modifications implemented as Java programs, which include Java producing HTML interface or Java business logic, are also in this category.

The newest version of Oracle E-Business Suite programs (version 12.2) provides limited “out of the box” support for “clustering” as part of this WebLogic Server basic license. However, only one WebLogic Server cluster for each application type in the E-Business Suite WebLogic Server domain is provided, which is configured by AutoConfig as follows:

Application Type WLS Cluster Description

oacore oacore_cluster1

Used for core functionality in EBS application-tier Java code,

including OAF-based functionality for EBS products

oafm oafm_cluster1 Used for web services, Secure Enterprise Search and Oracle

Transport Agent etc.

forms forms_cluster1 Serves all Oracle Forms functionality

forms-c4ws forms-c4ws_cluster1 Exposes Oracle Forms-based functionality as web services

oaea oaea_cluster1

An additional application type, which is not deployed out-of-the-

box, used when installing additional Oracle applications, such as Oracle

E-Business Suite AccessGate, eKanban and Spatial

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Different modification levels for E-Business Suite applications As per Oracle’s Application Licensing Table (the latest one available here), the license requirement for Oracle Database and Middleware programs are the same for the older and the newer versions of Oracle’s E-Business Suite programs. Applies to EBS 11i, 12.0, 12.1, 12.2 EBS customized? Yes – Purchase Full Use licenses for Oracle iAS EE and Oracle Database licenses No – Use restricted iAS EE and Oracle Database licenses Oracle distinguishes between three levels of modifications to its Oracle E-Business Suite applications, which have additional licensing requirements for the underlying database and other technologies. These modification levels are:

No Modifications: The customer is deploying the application without modifications. In this case, the customer receives a restricted use license for the Oracle Database Enterprise Edition and Oracle Internet Application Server Enterprise Edition, which includes WebLogic Server Basic and a limited set of other products. This restricted use license may only be used to run with the licensed application(s); it cannot be used for any other purposes.

Modifications implemented as Java programs and/or modifications to Forms, Reports and/or Workbooks: These modifications include any creation or modification of reports, forms, and/or workbooks. In addition, modifications implemented as Java programs, which include Java that produces HTML interface or Java Business Logic fall under this category. In these two scenarios, the customer receives a restricted use license for the Oracle Database Enterprise Edition and a limited set of other products. This restricted use license may only be used to run with the licensed application(s); it cannot be used for any other purposes. Additionally, the customer is required to purchase licenses for a limited set of products, including Oracle Internet Application Server Enterprise Edition for the total number of end users or processors for which the modifications are deployed.

Modifications to the database: Examples of these modifications include adding and/or modifying the tables, columns, stored procedures and triggers, which are part of the Oracle E-Business Suite application schema. In this situation, the customer is required to purchase licenses for the Oracle Database Enterprise Edition and the Oracle Internet Application Server Enterprise Edition for the total number of end users or processors for which the modifications are deployed. The customer receives a restricted use license of a limited set of products.

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License requirements for Oracle E-Business Suite – version 12.2 End users should be aware of the fact that for Oracle E-Business Suite version 12.2 a limited set of other Oracle programs may be required to be licensed. The reason for this is the (potential) use of the SOAP Protocol from Oracle’s Integrated SOA Gateway software. In order to clarify the additional license requirements for Oracle E-Business Suite version 12.2, please see the below overview: Applies to EBS 12.2

Using SOAP Protocol?

Yes - Purchase Full Use licenses for SOA Suite, EBS Adapter and WLS Suite

Note: Applies to both ISG and XML Gateway

No – No additional licenses needed

Note: Applies to both REST Services and Integration Repository Let’s further clarify what these different terms mean:

SOAP stands for Simple Object Access Protocol and ensures the communications of web applications over the Internet. The best way to communicate between applications is over HTTP, because HTTP is supported by all Internet browsers and servers, and SOAP was created to accomplish this. The use of SOAP Protocol can as well be triggered (indirectly) through the use of XML Gateway. With Oracle E-Business Suite Release 11i.4, Oracle XML Gateway became one of the key components of Oracle's application integration framework.

ISG stands for Integrated SOA Gateway and was first introduced in Oracle E-Business Suite Release 12.1. This was introduced as an infrastructure to provide and consume SOAP based Web Services.

Integrated SOA Gateway consists of:

- Service Invocation Framework

- Service Provider

- Service Monitor

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Oracle Integration Repository is a compilation of information about different service endpoints exposed by Oracle E-Business Suite applications. It provides a catalog of Oracle E-Business Suite’s business service interfaces. E-Business Suite public PL/SQL API’s can be deployed as REST-based Web Services from the E-Business Suite's Integration Repository. Although Integration Repository is used with Integrated SOA Gateway, it exists independently of Integrated SOA Gateway. So there is no requirement for a separate license of Oracle SOA Suite for Oracle Middleware and Oracle Applications Adapter (or E-Business Suite Adapter) to use the Integration Repository. As of version 12.2, the Integrated SOA Gateway has been rewritten to use Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Applications Adapter for SOAP Services. The EBS 12.2 ISG’s SOAP Services infrastructure cannot run without those products. Oracle SOA Suite and the Oracle Applications Adapter must be installed and configured separately by end users who want to use Oracle’s E-Business Suite version 12.2 Integrated SOA Gateway.

In case existing end users of the Oracle E-Business Suite wish to continue to use the EBS Integrated SOA Gateway (once they upgrade to 12.2), they will need to license Oracle SOA Suite and the Oracle Applications Adapter separately. In addition, in order to make use of SOA Suite, end users are required to obtain WebLogic Suite licenses (and both Weblogic Suite and SOA Suite are required to be licensed using the same license metrics). The deployment of SOA Suite and the Oracle Applications Adapter in support of the E-Business Suite 12.2 Integrated SOA Gateway will need to be sized according to the specific requirements of the end user. Depending on capacity, this deployment can happen onto the existing E-Business Suite deployment CPU(s), or onto some other CPU(s) which may need to be acquired for that use. The number of licenses required depends on the specific deployment of the Adapter.

The Integrated SOA Gateway in EBS 12.2 is designed to work with a distributed architecture. The SOA Suite instance used by Integrated SOA Gateway can be installed on one server and the E-Business Suite on a different server. However, the WebLogic Suite, SOA Suite and Oracle Applications Adapter licenses procured for ISG in EBS 12.2 can be used for other custom SOA implementations. End users using XML Gateway for protocols other than SOAP do not need to purchase any additional licenses in Oracle E-Business Suite version 12.2. However, the use of XML Gateway for SOAP protocol has a pre-requisite of the Integrated SOA Gateway in EBS (12.1 as well as 12.2). Therefore, end users using XML Gateway for SOAP protocol in EBS 12.2 require a license for Oracle SOA Suite, Oracle Applications Adapter and WLS Suite.

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Conclusion In case you are upgrading to Oracle E-Business Suite version 12.2, a total amount of 4 different licensing scenarios may be applicable:

1. If Oracle E-Business Suite is customized, then there are certain prerequisite products for which end users need to purchase a Full Use licenses: Oracle Internet Application Server Enterprise Edition and Oracle Database Enterprise Edition, Programmer and Internet Developer Suite.

2. If Oracle E-Business Suite is not customized then no additional licenses are required, as long as you continue to use the restricted use licenses of Oracle Internet Application Server Enterprise Edition and Oracle Database Enterprise Edition as per its restrictions.

3. If Oracle E-Business Suite is making use of SOAP Protocol (and this applies also to Oracle E-Business Suite Integrated SOA Gateway (ISG) and XML Gateway), then there are certain prerequisite products for which customers need to purchase a Full Use license, including SOA Suite (for Oracle Middleware), WebLogic Suite and E-Business Suite Adapter.

4. If Oracle E-Business Suite is NOT making use of SOAP Protocol (or REST Services or Integration Repository), then there are no additional licenses needed.

Organizations tend to underestimate the effort required to manage their software licenses and deploy all programs properly. Oracle E-Business Suite is no exception, as a sloppy business software license practice immediately weighs painfully on an organization's financial bottom line. Therefore, it is highly recommended to understand what you are entitled to make use of, what features and components are included in your E-Business Suite licenses and what restrictions are in place for different EBS versions that you might be deploying.

©2017 B-lay BV. All rights reserved.


About the author: Andra Tarata, Licensing Specialist "Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you'll land among stars!"- Les Brown Andra has been working in the Software Licensing industry for the last 8 years, analyzing and understanding licensing business practices & product development from multiple software vendors and helping clients to better manage their software entitlements. Andra leverages her experiences of working within Oracle’s License Management Services team to educate, equip and enable end-users to understand their enterprise software license entitlements. Andra holds a bachelor degree in Project Management from the National School of Political and Administrative Studies of Bucharest. Contact Andra: [email protected] We share our knowledge, so you can focus on the facts! Do you want to know more about different related license management topics, we have a selection of white papers available through www.b-lay.com. If you are in need of extra expertise and a structured approach, feel free to contact B-lay. We will help you make software compliance an exciting opportunity to improve your business! About B-lay B-lay is a specialist in software license management and provides services around software compliance, software audits, software asset management tools and insight in software spend. Our services offer organizations worldwide insight into the risks associated with software licenses, help prevent license compliance issues and help create considerable cost savings by optimizing their licensing position. B-lay was founded in 2008 and has offices in the Netherlands, Romania and the US. B-lay BV | Maliebaan 79 | 3581 CG Utrecht | The Netherlands | [email protected] | www.b-lay.com | +31 88 0233 700

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Oracle E-Business Suite 12.2 can bring additional license ...cdn.instantmagazine.com/upload/3863/20170510_oracle_e...Oracle E-Business Suite can bring additional license requirements