enterprise-ubuntu team mailing list archive

[Bolesław Tokarski <boleslaw.tokarski@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hello,

On 02/12/2013 01:32 PM, Chris Rowson wrote:
> How do you deal with Active Directory licensing? Are you buying a 
> Server Client Access Licenses for each Ubuntu machine?
I got the information. It appears we own an Enterprise CAL suite per 
employee, so it does not matter whether he uses Ubuntu or Windows on the 
client machine. It seems a better approach than a per-device licensing 
as it seems we have much more devices than users.

As I am thinking about minimising the cost of an Active Directory 
instance, this may be problematic. We use SSSD to authenticate directly 
against a domain controller, so each device actively connects to the DC, 
so license-wise we would need to have a per-device/user license anyway. 
However, just the policy part does not seem to be a problem - it is just 
one server getting LDAP details from AD.

I remember there was some change in Microsoft's licensing that they 
added a paragraph about multiplexing devices, so if you used a login 
forwarder (say, an LDAP proxy) you would still need to count devices 
connecting from behind the multiplexer. I am not sure how the MS license 
applies to a Samba 4 Domain Controller server running on par with 
Windows DC - it is not a multiplexing device, it authenticates users on 
its own.

I saw a number of organizations approaching the CAL licensing more or 
less seriously. Most small businesses that just want 'a server' buy the 
default Windows Server which comes with 5 CALs, never caring that they 
actually break the license by allowing it to be used by their 20-30 
employees. This is a perfect example why you should do better 
investigation when comparing costs Linux versus Windows.

If you want to be paranoid, you may note Microsoft patents. As recent 
trials show, Microsoft owns even such bizarre patents as "Filesystem 
containing both short and long file name", which by accident seems to be 
all of VFAT, FAT32 and NTFS, so if you are using a FAT32 filesystem on a 
USB stick and you are a sole Linux user, you should still pay Microsoft 
for using their patented technology. See also: 
http://www.osnews.com/story/24800/Microsoft_Earns_More_from_Android_than_Windows_Phone_7

Cheers,
Ballock