Licensing

Licenses

The Hewlett Packard Enterprise licensing mechanism enforces the licensing terms. All new HPE platforms ship unlicensed. On the initial login, you are redirected to the License tab of the Settings screen (see License Tab).

The Controller host may always be installed without a license; however, licensing limits the number of Worker CPU cores that can be installed in a deployment. Adding a new Worker host without sufficient available licensed cores will place that Worker host in the Unlicensed state.

Licenses apply to a certain number of CPU cores for a certain period of time. Each physical host in the deployment contains a certain number of CPU cores, and the cores in each host apply to the licensed maximum. You cannot assign only some of the CPU cores in a host to the deployment. For example, if your license is valid for 100 CPU cores and your infrastructure uses hosts with 8 CPU cores per host, then you can add a total of 12 hosts with 96 cores to the deployment; you cannot add only 4 of the 8 cores in a 13th host. In this example, to add the 13th host, you would need to expand your license to allow at least 104 CPU cores.

For licensing purposes, cores and core capacity is defined in HEWLETT PACKARD ENTERPRISE SOFTWARE END USER SUBSCRIPTION AGREEMENT

When working with Hewlett Packard Enterprise licenses:

You may have multiple coexisting licenses. A newer license does not replace an older license, but is cumulative. You will see a summary of each installed license (i.e. total number of licensed cores, latest expiration date, etc.).
You may obtain a limited-time evaluation (demo) license that allows an unlimited number of Worker host cores. The HPE Ezmeral Container Platform deployment will enter Lockdown mode when a demo license expires.
Removing the evaluation license will place HPE Ezmeral Container Platform into Lockdown mode. See Lockdown Mode.
HPE Ezmeral Container Platform displays a warning when the license expiration date is ninety (90) or fewer days from the current date. You may update the license at any time.

Types of Licenses

There are several types of license available for HPE Ezmeral Container Platform:

HPE Ezmeral Container Platform Evaluation: Allows you to run unlimited CPU cores for Big Data only via either Kubernetes or legacy EPIC. The deployment will go into Lockdown mode when the trial period ends.
HPE Ezmeral ML Ops Evaluation: Allows you to run unlimited CPU cores for AI/ML and/or Big Data via either Kubernetes or legacy EPIC. The deployment will go into Lockdown mode when the trial period ends.
HPE Ezmeral Container Platform: Allows you to run up to the licensed maximum number of CPU cores for Big Data only via either Kubernetes or legacy EPIC in HPE Ezmeral Container Platform. The deployment will go into Lockdown mode when the license expires.
HPE Ezmeral ML Ops: Allows you to run up to the licensed maximum number of CPU cores for AI/ML and/or Big Data via either Kubernetes or legacy EPIC in HPE Ezmeral Container Platform. The deployment will go into Lockdown mode when the license expires.
HPE Ezmeral External Kubernetes Cluster Management: Allows you import Kubernetes clusters that contain a certain number of CPU cores. If the number of CPU cores in imported Kubernetes clusters exceeds the licensed maximum, then you will not be able to create tenants in those clusters.

Information in a License

A license contains the following information:

Controller ID: Unique ID of the Controller host. You will need to provide this number to Hewlett Packard Enterprise to request a new or updated/extended license.
Name: Name of the license.
Number of cores: Number of CPU cores that can exist at any one time in this deployment. The total CPU cores reported by the combined physical hosts are counted against the total number of licensed cores.
Validity: Last day on which the current license will be valid, in MM-DD-YYYY format. A warning bar appears in web interface screens when the license is approaching its expiration data.
Version: Version of HPE Ezmeral Container Platform.
License File: Name of the current license file.

Adding Licenses

Required access rights: Platform Administrator

To add a license, do the following:

Complete installing the Controller host, if you have not done so already.
Log into the web interface as the Platform Administrator (see Launching and Logging In).
Open the System Settings screen, and then select the License tab (see The System Settings Screen and License Tab).
Click the Upload license button to navigate to and select a new license file. You will typically do this to extend your current license or to change the number of CPU cores you are able to use.
The specified license file uploads, and a confirmation message appears.
If this is an air gap environment, proceed to Configuring Air Gap Kubernetes Host Settings.
Proceed to Validating the Installation.

CAUTION:

If the license expires, then the deployment will go into lockdown mode (see Lockdown Mode). The platform administrator will not be able to exit lockdown mode until the license has been renewed.