Why Socket Count Matters for Oracle Database Server Standard Edition Licensing in ServiceNow SAM?

[Maniteja_2003]

[Article]

Have you installed SAM Pro and generated the Oracle License Report for your database servers?

If yes, this article is for you.

Before getting into deeper details, here is an important question:

How confident are you that the compliance results in the generated Oracle License Report are 100% accurate?

Oracle Database licensing depends on the edition of the database. This is a well-known fact.

But is having only the Oracle Database edition information enough for ServiceNow SAM to accurately determine compliance?

Absolutely not.

There is another important piece of information that can directly affect the Oracle licensing assessment: the number of processor sockets supported by the server.

This is where the Socket Count field on the Hardware Product Model becomes important.

Why Does Socket Count Matter?

For the Processor-based metric, the required number of licenses is determined by multiplying the total number of processor cores by the applicable Oracle Processor Core Factor.

But, for Oracle Database Standard Edition, Standard Edition One, and Standard Edition 2, the licensing calculation is different. In these editions, one processor is counted as equivalent to one occupied physical CPU socket.

For Example:

Server A has 2 physical CPU sockets, with 16 cores per socket.

For Oracle Database Standard Edition 2, the required number of licenses is 2, because licensing is based on the number of occupied physical sockets, not the total number of cores.

Therefore, ServiceNow SAM needs to understand not only:

"What Oracle Database edition is installed?"

but also:

"What is the socket capacity of the physical server on which Oracle Database is installed?"

This is why correctly populating the Socket Count on the Hardware Product Model is important for Oracle licensing in ServiceNow SAM.

Now coming to the important part, is socket count a discoverable attribute?

The answer is NO. It needs to be manually entered on the Model Record in the Hardware Model (cmdb_hardware_product_model) table.

Oracle Database Licensing Reference

Here is the link to understand the licensing for the Oracle Database:

Oracle Database Licensing

Thanks,

Maniteja.