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Tracking your Oracle licenses using AWS License Manager
Introduction
Many of our customers are running Oracle databases in AWS. They have asked for help with managing their Oracle licenses. In response, AWS has released some new features to AWS License Manager to help customers manage their Oracle licenses running in AWS. AWS License Manager is a service that helps customers manage their software licenses from software vendors such as Microsoft, SAP, Oracle, and IBM across AWS and on-premises environments. In this blog, we focus on the new AWS License Manager capabilities that help you manage your Oracle licenses running in Oracle as a service offering by AWS called Amazon RDS for Oracle.
With Amazon RDS for Oracle, AWS provides Oracle databases as a service, which frees you up to focus on application development. AWS manages time-consuming database administration tasks including provisioning, backups, software patching, monitoring, and hardware scaling. You can run Amazon RDS for Oracle under two different licensing models – “License Included” and “Bring-Your-Own-License (BYOL)”. In the “License Included” service model, you do not need separately purchased Oracle licenses; the Oracle database software has been licensed by AWS. If you already own Oracle database licenses, you can use the “BYOL” model to run Oracle databases on Amazon RDS. The “BYOL” model is designed for customers who prefer to use existing Oracle database licenses or purchase new licenses directly from Oracle. For more information, check licensing Amazon RDS for Oracle.
In this blog, let’s discuss how to configure AWS License Manager to track Oracle licenses used by database engine editions, options, and management packs used within Amazon RDS. In this way, AWS License Manager can track your Oracle licenses used within Amazon RDS for Oracle. With some additional configuration, AWS License Manager can track your Oracle licenses used on-premises and on EC2 instances.
Walkthrough
Metadata
| Time to read | 10 minutes (estimated) |
| Time to complete | 60 minutes (estimated) |
| Cost to complete |
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| Learning level | 200 |
| Services used |
Prerequisites
- AWS Account
- Oracle licenses (optional): Bring the Oracle licenses that you wish to track.
In this blog, we walk through the following scenarios:
- Scenario 1: Tracking Oracle licenses for databases running in Amazon RDS for Oracle in a BYOL licensing model.
- Scenario 2: Tracking Oracle options and packs licenses running in Amazon RDS
- Scenario 3: Tracking the number of licenses used when Oracle servers are decommissioned. AWS License Manager can not only track when Oracle licenses are consumed when new servers are added but also adjusts licenses consumed when Oracle servers are decommissioned.
Scenario 1: Tracking Oracle licenses for databases running in Amazon RDS
In this scenario, we discuss how you can use AWS License Manager to track Oracle database licenses used in Amazon RDS for Oracle.
- I have already set up Amazon RDS for Oracle. If you would like to follow along and have not set up Amazon RDS for Oracle, there is a guide connecting to Oracle database documentation. I set up an Oracle Enterprise edition running in Amazon RDS on t3.2xlarge, which has 8 vCPUs and 32-GiB RAM. Note that this is beyond free tier so you incur charges if you choose this instance type.
Amazon RDS for Oracle instance running on t3.2xlarge instance
- To set up AWS License Manager, open the AWS Management Console and navigate to License Manager.
How to search for AWS License Manager in the AWS management console
- If you are using License Manager for the first time, License Manager may prompt you to configure some initial settings. For more details, check getting started with AWS License Manager
AWS License Manager settings
- You now create a license configuration to track the number of Oracle licenses that you own. Press the Create license configuration.
Create license configuration
- On the Create license configuration screen, specify the following:
- License configuration name: Specify a name that describes what software the license configuration rule covers (for example, Oracle Enterprise licenses)
- For Description, add a description of the rule
- For License type, for the purposes of this scenario, I selected vCPUs. Customers should review their Oracle licensing agreement and choose the appropriate type based upon their agreement.
- For Number of vCPUs, enter the number of licenses that you own.
Specify license configuration details
- AWS License Manager performs automatic discovery of Oracle licenses, options, and packs used in Amazon RDS. If you want License Manager to automatically track Oracle database licenses, then under product information, specify the following:
- For Product name, select Oracle database
- For Product type, review the list of product types. For the purposes of this scenario, I am going to choose Enterprise Edition.
- For Resource type, select Amazon RDS.
- Press the Submit button when done.
Specify the Oracle license
- On an on-going basis, AWS License Manager discovers what resources are used in the environment. After this resource usage update, License Manager reports the licenses used on the dashboard. For the purposes of this blog, I set up an Amazon RDS for Oracle on t3.2xlarge instance, which has 8 vCPUs. License Manager updates my dashboard with the licenses consumed going from 0 to 8 (check following image). For more details on how License Manager updates its resource inventory, check resource inventory documentation.
License Manager show Oracle licenses consumed
- Click Dashboard on the console to check an overview of your license configuration rules and the licenses consumed by each of the products.
AWS License Manager dashboard updates to show Oracle licenses consumed
- On the dashboard, if you click the Oracle Enterprise licenses hyperlink, you can check details of the resources that License Manager detected as consuming the licenses, the AWS account ID, and the association date.
AWS License Manager shows what resources are consuming the licenses
Scenario 2: Tracking Oracle options and packs licenses running in Amazon RDS
AWS License Manager can also track Oracle options and management packs. In this scenario, I add a read replica to my Oracle database running on Amazon RDS. The read replica uses Oracle Active Data Guard. This scenario illustrates the tracking of Oracle option, Active Data Guard. Check Oracle read replica for Amazon RDS documentation for more information.
- To add a Read Replica, go to the Amazon RDS Select the Oracle database and go to Actions and then Create read replica.
Creating Oracle read replica
- On the Create read replica DB instance screen,
- For DB instance class, select an instance class. I picked t3.2xlarge, which has 8 vCPUs.
- For Multi-AZ, select No.
Specify Oracle read replica configuration
- Under the Network and Security, use the defaults.
Specify read replica network and security settings
- Under Settings, set a name for the DB instance identifier (for example, test-read-replica).
Specify read replica source and db instance name
- Review the other options. Select create read replica After a while, the read replica is created.
Read replica created
- If you switch back to the AWS License Manager console and review the license configurations, you can notice that the number of Oracle Enterprise licenses used has increased to reflect the licenses consumed by the read replica. In my environment, the licenses consumed went from 8 to 16.
AWS License Manager detects additional Oracle licenses consumed
- Now, we create a license configuration rule to track the Active Data Guard option licenses used. Select Create license configuration In the following picture, assume that we only have 30 vCPU licenses for Active Data Guard.
Create license configuration for Oracle Active Data Guard.
- For the product information,
- For Product name, specify Oracle database
- For Product type, specify Active Data Guard
- For Resource type, specify Amazon RDS
- Then, press the Submit
Specify Active Data Guard in licensing rule
- After a while, AWS License Manager scans and detects that Oracle Active Data Guard licenses are in use to enable the read replica. In my environment, AWS License Manager lists that 16 licenses of Active Data Guard are being consumed (8 vCPUs on the primary node and 8 vCPUs for the read replica).
AWS License Manager detects number of Active Data Guard licenses consumed.
In this scenario, we wanted to show you how to configure AWS License Manager to manage Oracle options and packs. Note that AWS License Manager only lists the options and packs that are managed by Amazon RDS for Oracle. Customer may activate other Oracle licenses from inside the Oracle database. Amazon RDS for Oracle and AWS License Manager does not have visibility inside the Oracle database.
Scenario 3: Tracking the number of licenses used when Oracle servers are decommissioned
AWS License Manager also tracks licenses when Oracle servers are decommissioned in Amazon RDS. In this scenario, we discuss how AWS License Manager decreases the count of licenses consumed when an Oracle server is decommissioned.
- Continuing the Scenario 2, there are 16 licenses consumed by both Oracle Active Data Guard licenses and Oracle Enterprise licenses. Check AWS License Manager dashboard in the following picture.
AWS License Manager dashboard shows Oracle licenses consumed
If you look at the license configuration rules, you can also find the same information reflected.
Amount of Oracle licenses consumed of each type.
- Go to the Amazon RDS console, we are going to delete the read replica that we created in the prior section.
Deleting Oracle read replica in Amazon RDS
- Select the read replica database and go to Actions and select Delete.
Delete read replica from Amazon RDS
- Enter delete me and press Delete.
Confirm read replica deletion in Amazon RDS
- Amazon RDS deletes the read replica.
Amazon RDS deletes the read replica
- Now, switch back to the AWS License Manager console. After about 15 minutes, the AWS License Manager rescans the inventory data and adjusts the license utilization.
AWS License Manages updates the licenses consumed.
- If you click the Dashboard link in the left navigation to view the License Manager dashboard, you notice that the number of licenses has decreased. The dashboard presents a great overview of all the licenses consumed at a glance.
AWS License Manager dashboard shows updated licenses consumed
In this scenario, AWS License Manager decreased the licenses consumed after the Oracle read replica was deleted. Notice that it adjusted the licenses consumed of both the Oracle Active Data Guard licenses (from 16 to 0) and the Oracle Enterprise licenses (from 16 to 8). We are still using 8 Oracle Enterprise vCPU licenses since we are running the Oracle database on the primary node.
Cleaning up
If you followed along in the blog and created AWS resources, we recommend cleaning up the environment so that you don’t incur further charges if you are not using these resources. To do this cleanup, you would delete initial Oracle database created in Scenario #1. Also, you could clean the AWS License Manager configuration rules.
Conclusion
In this blog, I showed you how to configure AWS License Manager to manage your Oracle licenses when using Amazon RDS. AWS License Manager can also be used to manage your other software licenses from other software vendors such as Microsoft, SAP, and IBM across AWS and on-premises environments. For example, I wrote a blog on managing your SQL Server licenses using AWS License Manager. Please let us know if there are other applications whose licenses that you want to manage with AWS License Manager and would like guidance on.
In this blog, I showed the configuration in a single AWS account. AWS License Manager can be used to track software usage across multiple AWS accounts. For more information on how to set up this configuration, check blog on tracking software usage using License Manager.
In addition, AWS License Manager has extensive API operations, which can be used to perform all these tasks and also lets you create your own custom dashboards. For more information on these topics, check API reference documentation.
If you would like to learn more about AWS License Manager, check the main documentation AWS License Manager service documentation. If you would like to learn more about Amazon RDS for Oracle, check Amazon RDS for Oracle documentation.
About the author
Dean Suzuki is a Senior Architect focused on helping customers run Microsoft Workloads in AWS. Dean has 20+ years of experience working with Microsoft technologies and enjoys helping customers gain the benefits of running their workloads in the cloud.