vesterli.com

The ADF framework has improved dramatically over the years, but mysteriously, it remains a niche product outside a select circle of Oracle enthusiasts. If you look at the Google Trends graph for the last couple of years (below), you see Forms slowly declining and APEX is slowing climbing at about the same rate. And far below both of these, you find ADF flatlined.

It seems that ADF is stuck in the no-mands-land where Oracle products suffer a slow death - not free, but too cheap for the Oracle salesforce to bother with.

It’s too bad - ADF 11g is a great product, and Oracle would do the world a big favor by setting ADF free (Oracle Mix, free oracle.com account required).

No Comments »

Traditionally, Oracle software is sold “forever,” i.e. on a perpetual license. However, it is also available on what is called a term license - for a limited number of years at some fraction of the cost of a perpetual license.

The Oracle price list states:

Term licensing available for all Oracle Products. The list price for a term license is based on a specific percentage of the perpetual license price. Annual terms licenses are available from 1 to 5 years: 1 year - 20% of list; 2 year - 35% of list, 3 year - 50% of list, 4 year 60% of list and 5 year 70% of list. Support for all term licenses is 22% of net perpetual fee.

Plotting cost vs. years used gives the following graph. (The example is Oracle WebCenter Suite, but that only affects the dollar amounts, not the trend.)

Obviously, if you intend to use the software for 10 years or more, a perpetual license is cheapest. That might be a good idea for the database, but there are many other Oracle products in areas where the technology is not quite settled yet. In these areas, you can minimize your risk by purchasing short-term licenses.

No Comments »

On one of the ODTUG mailing lists, we had a discussion about the cost of running ADF, so I thought I’d share the numbers I came up with.

The April technology price list shows:

• A pure TopLink and ADF license for $5800 per CPU. You can run this on any server - unfortunately, ADF 11g is only supported on Weblogic…
• Internet Application Server Standard Edition One for the same $5800 per CPU.

Interestingly, the Oracle Application Server includes something called WebLogic Server Basic (aka “The Secret WebLogic License”). Careful reading of the Oracle Fusion Middleware Licensing 11g manual will uncover the statement "When Oracle Internet Application Server is licensed independently of WebLogic Suite, a constrained WebLogic license, called WebLogic Server Basic, is included". You’ll find a description of this in Appendix A of the Licensing manual. While the restrictions do take away most of what makes WebLogic great, the basic JEE application server functionality remains - and ADF is not excluded.

Quick! Buy now, before the licensing rules change!

No Comments »

Coop (the biggest Danish retail chain with several brands) was just hit with a license claim in excess of 100 million Danish kroner (more than $16 million) by an unnamed vendor - see e.g. http://www.computerworld.dk/art/56271 (in Danish). They are known to be a big Oracle customer, but also have Microsoft software.

In the end, the vendor had to drop the claim and received zero kroner, but an inestimable loss of reputation. The customer is quoted as saying “if there is any way I can change vendor, I will do so”.

Sadly, everyone assumes that Oracle was the culprit. This might be true or false, but it does say something about the reputation Oracle has garnered lately.

No Comments »

The third thing I wish for from Oracle in 2010 is a free ADF runtime license. I believe that the current licensing is limiting ADF to existing Oracle enterprise customers, and that’s too bad.

I am not looking for Oracle to make ADF Open Source - but just to get the option to legally run ADF applications on Glassfish (and possibly JBoss and others). Support should be forum-based (like for Oracle XE).

This has several benefits:

• Universities could teach ADF (it’s full of brilliant code and design patterns) in the knowledge that students could use it outside the closed Oracle world.
• The thousands of capable developers in China, India, Phillipines and elsewhere, who are currently using Open Source solely for cost reasons, could pick up this brilliant tool.

It would not cannibalize existing revenue, as enterprise customers would still want to buy a support contract. But it would translate into both a wider ADF developer skills base and additional license revenue for Oracle as these customers eventually buy a support contract or upgrade to WebLogic.

Oracle is sitting on an unrecognized jewel while Java developers all over the world are wasting time with a plethora of much less capable frameworks. Help the world build better apps faster - set ADF Free!

Please vote for this idea on Oracle Mix.

No Comments »

The second thing I wish for from Oracle in 2010 is that Larry calls off the license sharks.

It seems that Oracle is currently working agressively to maximize the license fee from existing customers, and customers are unhappy.

Here in Denmark, the last month has seen the media reporting:

• Oracle taking Scandinavian Airlines to court over license claims

• The Danish and Swedish postal service deciding not to base future development on Oracle, due to a license dispute
• A case where an intelligent road sign used an Oracle database, and Oracle claimed every passing motorist as a user

I don’t know the details, and each and every of these claims might be completely correct from a legal and contractual standpoint. But the fact that these cases appear in the media show that the customers are unhappy and feel strong-armed by Oracle.

Having dedicated my professional life to becoming an expert on Oracle tools, I find this trend very worrying. A salesman can always leave Oracle and go sell IBM or Microsoft - but my skills are not as easily transferred.

I wish Oracle would spend more time explaining their position so that an agreement can be reached that does not jeopardize Oracle’s long-term market share.

If you agree, please vote for this idea on Oracle Mix - and feel free to comment below, to sten@vesterli.com or on Oracle Mix.

No Comments »