As Sage 100 Premium consultants, we need to have a clear understanding of the SQL licensing requirements as they apply to a Premium installation. I don't want or need to be a MS licensing expert, however, we need to be able to advise the end user as to the proper configuration...SQL licenses needed, memory allocated, recovery mode, log file size, etc. Sage should document these requirements in the SPM.
Original Message:
Sent: 06-19-2023 11:56
From: Wayne Schulz
Subject: Upgrading Sage 100 v2016 Premium to v2022 Premium
This should come out of urgent support.
Another thing to consider - and the main reason I started my own FAQ on Premium - if the customer calls Sage for better information on SQL requirements, they will probably come away more confused than before they called. The last two customers I had called Sage returned to me saying that whoever they spoke to at Sage could not provide any additional guidance.
I strongly advocate using FAQs (or checklists) since you can cover a LOT of information that the customer might "forget" to ask. This saves a TON of headaches when you are 85% of the way through your Premium migration and the customer asks what happened to their Custom Financial reports that they'd been using in their old Sage 100 since 3.71.
Whenever I have another unique situation with a Premium migration, I add it to the FAQ. For the next customer, I have an updated FAQ they can review ( or not ), which covers all the gotchas I've had prior customers ask about.
I follow a similar tactic: "Will Sage 100 run on _______". I never under any circumstances give a yes or no. I provide the SPM and let the customer's IT department review it.
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Wayne Schulz
wayne@s-consult.com
Schulz Consulting
(860) 516-8990
Moodus, CT
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Original Message:
Sent: 06-19-2023 11:43
From: Jerry Norman
Subject: Upgrading Sage 100 v2016 Premium to v2022 Premium
IMO, we're too far into the weeds here. We should be bringing focus to the customer's value and outlining their choices in deciding what to do.
Earlier, I brought up my previous SLX experience. But we purposely never actually quoted SQL Server costs. Like the server and related costs, we always left that to the customer's IT team to figure out. The customer used those estimates/quotes to add to our costs to understand their cash costs of converting from whatever they had at first to SLX or other alternatives.
As Sage consultants, we should too. If this is your customer's first experience with SQL, then the MS licensing cost is probably a shock. If they already use SQL for other apps, then they probably aren't asking. If they're asking, we must point them back to their IT because it's their quotes that matter. If that makes the customer's shift to Premium "too expensive," then we must reengage them in a value exploration: "what benefits were you hoping to gain by using our SQL version?"
They have other choices to consider: Sage 100 Providex, keeping their current site, the alternative ERP lurking in the background, etc.
SQL licensing cost is part of the reason that competitive cloud offerings are more expensive than Sage 100. Can't change that. But we CAN work to change the customer's understanding of the value that Sage 100 brings to them.
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Jerry Norman
Smartbridge Partners
(512) 653-7498
Original Message:
Sent: 06-19-2023 11:16
From: Kevin Moyes
Subject: Upgrading Sage 100 v2016 Premium to v2022 Premium
The nuances of SQL licensing are beyond my expertise, and we always push clients to manage their own SQL licenses.
The two license explanation from Sage never made sense to me. Yes, MAS_User, through the Sage service, handles read-write activities of the program. MAS_Reports credentials are sent to the client software when printing a Crystal Report (for accessing read-only SQL data). But Sage doesn't allow everyone using the same Sage login and calling that one connection.
This seems to reinforce that impression:
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Kevin Moyes
Technical Systems Analyst
Munjal White Consulting Co.
Toronto ON
Original Message:
Sent: 06-19-2023 09:10
From: Gary Feldman
Subject: Upgrading Sage 100 v2016 Premium to v2022 Premium
@Doug Higgs @Jerry Norman - From my experience Microsoft was not concerned with how an application worked, but whether the user was capable of accessing the functions it licensed. So where the domain controllers are or what the application does is only a factor if the user can access the functionality. So if the user authenticates to a domain via a dedicated domain controller or one on the Sage100 server is irrelevant. Can the user through the network access the SQL Server is the question. For example, if the user can access SQL Management tools or query a database using their credentials via Excel, then the user has access to the SQL Server and should be included in the lis tof named users (if server based licensing is not applied).
Just like we never gave tax advice and recommended customers talk with their CPA, in cases where we did not control the domain or rights within the domain, we would always refer the customer to their LAR.
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Gary Feldman
I-Business Network
Marietta GA
16786270646
http://www-i-bn.net
Original Message:
Sent: 06-18-2023 17:26
From: Doug Higgs
Subject: Upgrading Sage 100 v2016 Premium to v2022 Premium
@Gary Feldman Regarding " if the user was named on the server, we had to put in controls to prevent them from using a license in order not to charge them for a license. ": If Sage 100 is on a VM and SQL Server is on a separate VM, and the Sage 100 VM or the SQL server VM are not domain controllers, then I wonder if only two SQL licenses are required. Since active directory (named users) are not on either the Sage 100 server or the SQL server are only two SQL licenses needed?
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Doug Higgs
Midwest Commerce Solutions, Inc
(312) 315-0960
Chauffeur, Chef, and Personal Assistant to Sprinkles
Original Message:
Sent: 06-18-2023 12:33
From: Gary Feldman
Subject: Upgrading Sage 100 v2016 Premium to v2022 Premium
The Microsoft license in a hosted environment was very clear that if a named user had the ability to use a license, they would be liable for the license regardless of whether they used it or not. I believe the logic is consistent with standard licenses. Under this logic, if the user was named on the server, we had to put in controls to prevent them from using a license in order not to charge them for a license. We did this with groups and related group policies for Office and SQL licenses.
Resellers are not the Microsoft License Police, but we should be careful not to recommend solutions in violation of license requirements in case of audit.
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Gary Feldman
I-Business Network
Marietta GA
16786270646
http://www-i-bn.net
Original Message:
Sent: 06-18-2023 11:58
From: Jerry Norman
Subject: Upgrading Sage 100 v2016 Premium to v2022 Premium
Expanding Gary's experience. With SLX, users logged into a server, but only the SLX app knew about the SQL Server, communicating to it with the SLX SQL user id.
Does Sage 100 Premium communicate with SQL via a Sage SQL user, or with named users?
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Jerry Norman
Smartbridge Partners
(512) 653-7498
Original Message:
Sent: 06-18-2023 08:28
From: Gary Feldman
Subject: Upgrading Sage 100 v2016 Premium to v2022 Premium
Having been through a number of Microsoft audits, the auditor will almost always err on the side of you owe money. However, the rules with SQL Server were very clear the last time I was audited (about 3 years ago). If a named user accesses SQL Server the licenses are either by the core or required for each named user. If the connection is anonymous to the server by the program, but the user is named on the server they will consider that user named and charge for the license.
For a true web application, where the named user never authenticates to the server (Sage CRM only user for example), the argument seems mirkier as the server never knows who the named user is. They were named users in our internal systems, but not on the server. We refused to pay for that and eventually they went away (although they never officially agreed with our argument).
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Gary Feldman
I-Business Network
Marietta GA
16786270646
http://www-i-bn.net
Original Message:
Sent: 06-18-2023 03:55
From: Phil McIntosh
Subject: Upgrading Sage 100 v2016 Premium to v2022 Premium
When Sage was selling SQL licenses they quoted it at the number of Sage users. No idea if that was an M$ dictate or Sage getting greedy, but it would seem that someone ought to provide a clear answer that would hold up on an audit.
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Phil McIntosh
President
Friendly Systems, Inc.
Original Message:
Sent: 06-17-2023 23:58
From: Jerry Norman
Subject: Upgrading Sage 100 v2016 Premium to v2022 Premium
This has probably changed, but up until we dropped Saleslogix, the rule for SQL Server, which underpinned the app, was you only needed the 2 license for SA and SLX users. The rest were Windows apps. This also made sense because lots of users were remote, meaning their laptop instances of SLX sat on top of SQL Express.
I think Sage has been silent on this requirement for Sage 100 Premier so they would sell more SQL ....
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Jerry Norman
Smartbridge Partners
(512) 653-7498
Original Message:
Sent: 06-17-2023 23:51
From: Steve Iwanowski
Subject: Upgrading Sage 100 v2016 Premium to v2022 Premium
I agree with Kevin and Carmen that the best course of action is compliance with the PFM, but I'd speculate that the only reason Sage dropped SQL 2014 support is because Microsoft dropped SQL 2014 Active Support (security support continues until next year, i believe), not for any technical or performance reason.
Ultimately, SQL Server licensing comes down to the honor system until an audit occurs, but as a Microsoft Partner, the licensing guideline we follow is if a human obtains any benefit directly or indirectly from a service, they require a license. I've heard Sage's two-SQL-user-only explanation before but I've never seen confirmation from Microsoft that it's legit (and I would love to be wrong!)
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Steve Iwanowski, NextStep Technology Advisors, aka DSD Lancaster PA ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Original Message:
Sent: 06-17-2023 23:27
From: Chris Love
Subject: Upgrading Sage 100 v2016 Premium to v2022 Premium
That was a question I had as well, which was how many SQL users would they need as it relates to Sage if they have 50+ Sage users. Would you need 50+ users for SQL as well? If so, then licensing by core became more cost effective. That was our understanding.
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Chris Love
Accounting Systems, Inc. (ASI)
Original Message:
Sent: 06-17-2023 15:57
From: Carmen Cruz
Subject: Upgrading Sage 100 v2016 Premium to v2022 Premium
I'm sorry, but that should be an absolute no. 2014 SQL is not going to have the power of the 2019 version does and is not supported at all with Sage. You are going to have problems with Sage 2022 starting with performance, TLS and on and on. They need to remain in compliance regardless of the amount of money they have to spend I'm sorry to say. You only need 2 user licenses for SQL. You know that right? One for the mas_user and one for the mas_report accounts used by Sage. If they're doing a bunch of extra stuff they may need more licenses but that would not be because of Sage. Sage only wants 2. Just a thought.