SQL 2012 and User CALs

  • Hi all just a quick and random question. I need to build a SQL 2012 Development server and get 25 users access to it. Does anyone know if you can use SQL 2017 user CALs for this? Sorry if there is a delay in my reply as I work in Asia. Thanks in advance. 

    P.s. I've read about 50 posts about this, spoken to Microsoft licensing and our software vendor and noone seems to know....gotta love Microsoft licensing!

  • If you setting up a DEVelopement server then no licensing is required - although to be on the safe side it may be advisable to have all the users register for Visual Studio Dev Essentials. This is no longer required for SQL 2017 alone (kind of hate MS cause of this)

    If instead you are talking about a Production server then according to the licensing terms the user CAL grant access to previous versions https://download.microsoft.com/download/7/8/C/78CDF005-97C1-4129-926B-CE4A6FE92CF5/SQL_Server_2017_Licensing_guide.pdf page 14

    If your intention is for a production server with licensing for 2017 depending on the circumstances you may also be able to deploy a previous version instead - see page 34 above - but as it is not exactly clear on the conditions you would need to clarify with Microsoft on this one. In any case if you have 2 prod servers, 1 is 2012 and the other is 2017, both with call licenses the CAL from 2017 allow access to the 2012 instance.

  • Thanks that's very helpful

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