Question

Photo of Michael Degnan

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SQL License Mixup

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If this question has already been asked sorry in advance. 


We have a confusing situation with our SQL licensing. We have our vendor that is doing our Arena -> Rock conversion and we also have our IT consultant company and their answers do not line up so I wanted to throw this out to the community. 

We are putting our Rock environment in the Azure cloud thanks to the $5000 per year donation. Because we are a larger church we are building out using the guidelines for large organizations (D2-IIS, D11-SQL). Building out machines is the easy part of this until we get to SQL licensing. Below I will outline the 2 scenarios we have been given.


Rock Migration Vendor: Says to build the D11 server in Azure then purchase the SQL STD core licensing from Techsoup and install. This put the project cost for SQL at a one time cost of less than $800 

IT consultant: States that to be legal we need to purchase our SQL license through Azure since we are using their virtual platform. The Yearly cost of this option is $3,500 


Personal Research: I have found documentation that support both of these options which has made the situation less clear to me.

I have started to do some side research to see if we can use SQL web version to run Rock because this option is much cheaper to purchase through Azure, if you have any insight on that topic it would be greatly appreciated also. 


Thank you 

  • Photo of Shawn Ross

    4

    Michael, this is a good question. Thanks for posting it here, because I'm sure it will come up again with others. Here's my understanding of how SQL Licensing works and how it applies to your situation.

    SQL can be licensed either:

    • As 'Azure SQL': You provision the SQL Database as a Service. Azure manages many of the database aspects for you
    • As 'Self-managed SQL': You procure licensing on your own (TechSoup, etc.), install SQL on a server/VM, and manage it yourself. The server/VM could be on your own servers, or in a hosted environment like Azure. Azure also has a 'Hybrid Use Benefit'; this applies to the Windows Server Operating System Environment (OSE). I know of no Hybrid Use Benefit for SQL Server.


    So based on your statement of a D2 VM for IIS and a D12 VM for database/SQL:

    • You need 2x Windows Server OSE licenses. The current Windows Server Licensing is Core-Based. Techsoup has a good article on Windows Server Editions and Licensing. You can just provision through Azure, or use licenses you purchased (example: Techsoup w/ SA) and provision using your Hybrid Use Benefit. How to provision using the HUB is outlined in Rock Solid Azure Hosting.
    • You need the appropriate SQL licensing for the VM you have provisioned. A 'Standard_D12' VM has 4 vCores. SQL Server Standard Edition (Current Version) uses Core-Based Licensing. For a TechSoup purchase, this means you will need quantity 2 of the 'SQL Server Standard Edition (Core-Based Licensing)'. Quantity 2 of the 2-core licenses is a minimum. You want to use core-based since managing SQL CAL's for a Rock install is a practical impossibility ;)


    To keep in mind:

    • Techsoup licenses include 2 years of SA by default. This means for 2 years you'll have active SA. In my experience it's best to just plan to re-purchase every 2 years (keeping you licensing current).
    • If you change the size of your SQL VM, you may need more SQL Core-Based Licensing. Each core of the VM running SQL must be licensed.
    • I believe that when hosting with Azure for IIS you do not need an External Connector License for the Windows Server VM hosting IIS. If hosting on your own server (say at the church) you would need External Connector Licensing.
  • Photo of Shawn Ross

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    As a side note, if using Azure VM's, please keep in mind:

    • Performance of the boot disk (C:) is capped
    • The 'D:' drive is considered temporary. Don't put production data on it
    • If storing files on the VM, use an additional disk that you've provisioned for the VM. It will perform significantly better than C: or D: and you'll be in a properly supported configuration.
  • Photo of Shawn Ross

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    Michael, we're evaluating how we do Azure also, and I'm curious, what is the size of your organization and how many person records are you dealing with that lead you to outgrow the S3 Azure SQL database instance?
  • Photo of Michael Degnan

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    Hey Shawn 

    Our system is close to the 20,000 Records mark (not all active members) which puts us in the really big small organization or a small Large organization. We also have 3 locations that will all need to access the system on an Sunday morning. 

    There is really 2 factors that made us want to up-size our implementation:

    1. All 3 locations are looking at moving to Kid's and Event check-in through Rock 

    2. Rock will be hosting our main webpage as well as church database. 

    Thanks