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at our company we have a data warehouse based on SQL Server 2008 R2 EE and some applications developed with Visual Studio 2013. For an upcoming rewrite of the data warehouse I would like to rebuild it using the SQL Server 2012 EE as foundation.

We have 5 developers with MSDN subscriptions and 5 sales guys, who use the actual data warehouse for decision making, equipped with SQL Server 2012 Developer Edition CALs to test the new build of the data warehouse.

So far so good...

My plan was to install the SQL Server 2012 developer edition within our companies network in a virtualized environment. We have a VMWare ESX farm where the sysops gave me two virtual machines, one for test and one for demonstration purposes. Due to the nature of the ESX farm it is possible that the currently active data warehouse and the new 2012 based data warehouse are on the same physical vm host.

Our software license gurus say, that the virtual machines with sql server 2012 developer edition needs to be on a separate physical machine. Is this right?

If so, that would mean, that we would need to buy additional hardware, just for the migration to SQL Server 2012. I can't belief this.

Another problem is the licensing term of being connected to a production system. The nature of the data warehouse is data, that is always coming from some kind of production databases (in our case oracle databases). Is it right, that we can't have "production data" in the new development data warehouse?

I hope you can clear my headaches a little bit. :-)

Aaron Bertrand
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Gordon Bergling
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    This question appears to be off-topic because it is about software licensing. Please contact your licensing representative to ensure you are compliant - your peers can't tell you that (and you can't use their words here in court as justification). – Aaron Bertrand Dec 19 '14 at 19:39
  • Sorry if I am being off-topic, but this is not about an legal issue, it is more about getting information about how other developers have used the sql server developer edition within a vmware farm. – Gordon Bergling Dec 19 '14 at 19:44
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    Ultimately, though, your main concern should be whether your use of Developer Edition for what seems to be production processes and data consumption is legal. You need to ensure that anything you plan to do keeps you in compliance, and you need to ensure that your bosses and your company's legal team have documentation that you made those assurances. – Aaron Bertrand Dec 19 '14 at 19:45
  • (Also, is an additional server really your biggest concern? How much does a server cost compared to Enterprise Edition licenses?) – Aaron Bertrand Dec 19 '14 at 19:46
  • Thanks for your comment Aaron. Lets say that this former mentioned demonstration system would be used for getting the founding for the sql server licensing costs. If we have to buy a machine for 20k just for getting a demonstration system up and running the whole invest could be a risk. About the data and processes, the data would be a backup from the production system from about a month ago. The processes are completed disabled for the data warehouse. – Gordon Bergling Dec 19 '14 at 19:56
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    Sorry, you still need to talk to a licensing expert, not peer developers. – Aaron Bertrand Dec 19 '14 at 19:57
  • And production data is production data. It doesn't matter how old the data is. If they're using it to make business decisions, that's not testing and development. YOU NEED TO BE LEGAL. – Aaron Bertrand Dec 19 '14 at 19:59
  • Okay Aaron, I think I now know what you are mean. On your last comment you nailed it. We want to use a snapshot of the "old" production data, just to have something in the database / tables. The data isn't used for any decision making. Is just about to have something to work with while doing the migration to sql server 2012. You can't simple randomize data to populating a data warehouse in a very reasonable size. Off course your right about not not peering a developer on this. Sorry... – Gordon Bergling Dec 19 '14 at 20:16
  • You might want to fix the wording then because it certainly sounds like the data warehouse is being used for decision making: `5 sales guys, who use the actual data warehouse for decision making, equipped with SQL Server 2012 Developer Edition CALs` <--- sales guys have no business using Developer Edition CALs. You should fix that *before* you contact your Microsoft licensing rep. Developer Edition ***is not a free lunch***. – Aaron Bertrand Dec 19 '14 at 20:19
  • Aaron, I'll fix the wording. The sales guys are just owning developer Edition CALs to verify the working / implementation of the new data warehouse. For the production system we having off course licenses for the whole server (physical licenses to have n-virtual machines). – Gordon Bergling Dec 19 '14 at 20:26

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"Customers cannot use the software in a production environment and any test data that was used for design, development or test purposes must be removed prior to deploying the software for production use."-Licensing Guide

I would say you can use old production data as test data, that is how I have normally seen this done. You certainty have any production processes hitting your data warehouse dev environment because you will be running afoul of the licensing agreement. I would not do something like a daily backup because I think that would be close to crossing the line on the license.

They do not have to be on separate physical machines. They can be on the same physical machine with many VMs. I have never experienced that or have seen that in a MS licensing agreement. I attached the MS Sql Server 2012 Licensing guide and it makes no mention of this.

download.microsoft.com/download/7/3/C/73CAD4E0-D0B5-4BE5-AB49-D5B886A5AE00/SQL_Server_2012_Licensing_Reference_Guide.pdf.

Nick
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