Licensing Question

Do we need a SQL CAL (client access license) for every member registration or for every member who is currently online using the ASPplayground bulletin board?

no, not at all as ASP/ASP.NET will use a single account to represent all users connecting to the database, whether you connect to the db using SQL or Windows security.

Samuel,
 
Do you have any reference for the licensing issue that I can show my IT department?  They are saying that our version of SQL server (MS SQL Standard) is based on user licenses and not CPU and that we need to have one SQL CAL for each user logged into SQL.  Can you help me help them understand how your bulletin board system is setup to access SQL so that we only need one connection?  This is all very frustrating as I am trying to stay legal on the licensing of this system.  Thank you.

no I don't have any reference for SQL server licensing. But I can give you a simple overview of what it is (I will use capital letters for a user account in SQL server, USER):

A user in the forum software does not equal to a USER in the SQL server. None of the user accounts in the software access the SQL server with their own credentials. When connecting to the SQL server, the software uses either SQL Security (you supply a username and password in the connection string) or Windows Security (the software will assume the identity of either IUSR_Machinename, ASPNET or Network Service) to access the SQL server, which means ALL forum users are seen as ONE SINGLE USER as far as SQL server is concerned. Of course, there will be multiple connections initiated by this particular USER (because there will always be more than one user visiting your forum), but that still counts as ONE USER as far as SQL licensing is concerned.

So, if you have a 5 user CAL, when the software is running, you can only have 4 more USERS accessing the SQL server (either directly from Enterprise Manager, or as a USER used by another software application).

This is how I understand the SQL server licensing scheme. If in doubt, contact Microsoft for a detailed explanation.

Samuel,
 
Sorry to seem like I am beating a dead horse.  I want to make sure we are not violating any license agreement.  When I gave your last message to our IT department they said that I need to look at the article on Microsoft's web site regarding the use of other devices to access SQL server.  The link they provided me is http://www.microsoft.com/sql/howtobuy/multiplexing.asp.
 
Could you take a look at this and help me explain to my IT department why we do not need a CAL for each person who accesses SQL?  Based on what I read, it appears that we need to have one CAL for each user who is accessing the SQL server.  Do you have any information that can help me with this question?  Obviously, if we had thousands of CALs or processor-based SQL licenses this wouldn't be an issue for us.  CALs are not cheap and the processor-based licenses are very expensive.
 
I hope you can help me clear this up.  Thank you, Samuel.

I am a bit confused too. Please ask Microsoft directly to clear up the confusion. There are two different CAL model too, one is for User and the other for Device, so it is quite complicated. To save money, you can go with a host that provides SQL server as part of the service. This is what I do, and it saves me a lot of money.

let me answer your questions:

1. with less than 500 posts a day, you don't have to worry about processing power, as long as your hardware is current, which means you can use the current generation of Celeron processor without any problem
   
2. I tested the software with Virtual Server 2005 before but not VMware, and it ran just fine as long as you provide a reasonable machine by sticking to the virtual system vendor's recommedation
   
3. The software will authenticate users as long as the user is logged in to the active directory first
   
4. the full version license. If you are asking about SQL server licensing, your best bet is to go with per-processor.
   
5. total cost of software 297 + active directory plugin 100. You will have to provide your own machine and thus I can't give you the total cost.
   

thank you for responding.
 
# 1, 2 and 3 answers make sense to me.
 
# 4: I know that SQL server licensing is our problem, the question mas malformed on my part.
 
# 5:  so, the total cost is $ 397, with AD plugin. That sounds resonable and the software seem very responsive, it seems faster than other forums that run open source. Or, is this just my imagination?
 
Anyway, let's say there is a security hole -- how quickly can we have it fixed  (on average)
Is there a demo/time limited version that I can download and install for our people to "test drive"
 
 
thanks

Our software's performance is outstanding. See here.

for security issues - once I am notified and be able to confirm the bug, I usually fix it right away (the same day), and it never took me more than 48 hours before I release a patch.

I am sorry to say that we do not have a time limited version for downaload. The online demo can be reached at http://www.aspplayground.net/dem2/

So Samuel are you the guy who wrote this software?
cool!
 
I understand that you do not have demo version.
 
this forum seem to work really well.

yap, I am the author of the software. Thanks for your comment 

Samuel
I like to purchase the license for forum software and AD plugin.
I have read your licensing requirements that specify that I need to specify an url/domain name
that will be accessible from the internet, or so I have understood.
 
Well, I would like to install this forum software and document it in my VMware virtual (test) network before the deployment on our production network.
So, initialy, while on test network, the forum software would not be accessible from the internet, but once configured and tested -- I will move it then to a production server that will be accessable from the internet, not necessarily by domain name but an IP address/url combo.
so, how do we do this?
 
 

don't worry about the requirement for now. I will approve your purchase and grant you permission to download the software without an URL first. You can update your forum profile to include your URL once you have it.

Thanks

thank you very much.
I'll go ahead and order it.

BTW, should i purchase advanced edition vs. standard edition?
 I would also need AD plugin. Can you tell me what is the package that i should buy if I want my users to use unified domain login?