SQL Anywhere Standard Edition chip license

[former_SQLA_member1695107]

Understood this is on old /obsolete version of SQLA.

But some question in regards to licensing for DB server on VM environment.

If the DB server is a VM hosted from a large cluster, and is restricted to use 1 processor. For the licensing of subject product, would a 1 chip license sufficient, or need to license the underlying physical host of the cluster ?

And if you only have 1 chip license, would the license restrict only to use 1 cpu, eventhough the VM may have more cpu ?

Am new in terms of licensing for this and getting conflicting comments from blogs and forum.

[Vlad]

If you have the license based on the number of CPUs, then your SQL DB process will not consume more CPU than you have payed for, regardless how big your VM is.
But keep in mind (I saw it in few other posts here), in many cases VM shows you processors with 1 core per 1 CPU regardless your real CPU architecture can be different (e.g. 4 cores per 1 CPU).
And people surprised why the server detected virtual cores in an unexpected manner.

[johnsmirnios]

The licence limits will be applied based on the CPU topology as seen from within the VM. Different VM software products present the processors to the VM instance differently: some present each logical processor as if it is in its own socket, some mimic the underlying hardware, some make it configurable, etc.

[Breck_Carter]

Leadership in Licencing!

[johnsmirnios]

Not sure how to interpret that reply. In any case, the fundamental underpinning of virtualization is to have the VM software "lie" to the client software to present a machine environment that isn't the same as the host environment. SQLA goes through the normal CPU detection code (cpuid instruction, etc) & the VM software can present whatever it wants to present. There are "red pill" APIs for some VM software packages to allow you to peek at the host environment but it's a different API for every VM software product.

In short, we are at the mercy of whatever the VM software presents to us -- that's how virtualization works. If you are running your own VM software (Xen, VMWare, etc), maybe you can configure the topology that the guest OS will see. If not, there's not much you or we can do. If it's a huge impact (maybe huge deployments on EC2?), you could maybe appeal to the sales team to upgrade licenses due to the mismatch between host & guest topologies but I'm not on the sales team so don't quote me on that :).

[VolkerBarth]

Or "Invisible Product Management", whatever one prefers...

[VolkerBarth]

John, you are certainly technically correct here - not knowing the details myself, I have to assume that but I'm very confident based on all your other valueable responses within this forum over the years, which are very appreciated, of course!

That being said, I agree with Breck that it's really unsatisfying that there does not seem to be an official document on that important topic. I know there was one within the former iAnywhere blogs by Chris or Jason but even that was quite hidden – and SQL Anywhere Sales statements seem hidden/non-existing nowadays, as well.

---

To clarify: Yes, I'm fully aware that this lack of information is not your responsibility at all.

[Breck_Carter]

"Not sure how to interpret that reply"... in a friendly supportive way, with the PHB representing Licencing and Alice standing in for all the victims, er, innocent bystanders 🙂