Why we fixed Oracle database licensing (#1)
Daniel Hesselink
Levelling the skillsets between clients and Oracle at License Consulting & Vertical Lead at IT Asset Alliance (ITAA)
Validated Oracle compliance tools only help Oracle
Oracle database license compliance is a ‘secret’ that only Oracle wants to reveal - during a compliance audit. It provides Oracle with the utmost leverage for negotiations, resulting in the lowest discount which is then reflected in the annual support fees (22% of the NET license deal).?Whereas most software vendors have clear guidelines and instructions (and tools) to monitor the deployment of licensed software, Oracle keeps the road towards license compliance hidden to it's customers.
Garrick Brivkalns, Oracle’s Program Manager for Global Licensing & Advisory services admitted that Oracle’s data collection tool for data gathering is only available during engagements with Oracle (=audits). AND, that the reports reflected to Oracle customers by Oracle validated tools (such as Flexera) are irrelevant to Oracle during such audits because Oracle will only work with the raw data:?As reported by?The Register?on March 17 2022.
Unfortunately, the raw data from Flexera and others, as well as the data collected by Oracle’s Collection Tool, is unfit to be analysed by clients themselves. This is nothing new: Since the ‘Validated Tool Program’ was initiated in 2010, the following disclaimer is noted on?Oracle’s website:
Usage data gathered from these tools will still need to be analyzed by Oracle to assess license needs and provide the customer with a compliance statement.
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The actual reports presented by the tools are a marketing trick. They seem to be pre-defined by Oracle, difficult to understand, and contain many false-positives. And so, for Oracle, the Validated Tool Program really just simplifies the execution of audits at clients who have invested in validated tools. Unlike other clients, companies who bought into Validated Oracle Tools have most of the raw audit data readily available! On numerous occasions, we’ve illustrated that the human-readable reports generated by the validated tools are incorrect.?Which is exactly why Oracle insists on obtaining the raw data during audits.
Having a discovery tool for Oracle databases is a great thing. Just don't believe that the reporting format will be helpful - or correct.
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