Oracle recently updated their Lifetime Support policy guidelines for many of their products.
Because so many of their legacy systems have moved out of Premier and Extended Support tiers, Oracle has placed more emphasis on indefinite timelines for Sustaining Support. They’ve indicated that Sustaining Support will be available for as long as you maintain technical support for your Oracle program licenses.
Sustaining Support Timelines
| Release | GA Date | Premier Support Ends | Extended Support Ends | Sustaining Support Ends |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Forms and Reports 11gR2 (11.1.2.x) | Oct 2011 | Dec 2016 | Dec 2018 | Indefinite |
| Fusion Middleware 12c (12.1.x) ***** | Dec 2011 – Feb 2015 | Dec 2017 | Dec 2019 | Indefinite |
| Fusion Middleware 12c (12.2.x) ***** | Oct 2015 – Apr 2016 | Aug 2022 | Aug 2025 | Indefinite |
What Support is Included in the Sustaining Support Tier?
With Sustaining Support, Oracle assures that you will receive some technical support, including access to online support tools, knowledgebase, and experts. It will be available indefinitely after the Premier Support and Extended Support tiers both expire.
However, according to Oracle, program releases under Sustaining Support are no longer fully supported, so access to information and skills, and the ability to run those releases, may be limited.
Sustaining Support will receive Software Update License & Support limited to the following:
Program updates, fixes, security alerts, and critical patch updates created during Premier Support and Extended Support (if offered and only after the Extended Support period ends)
Tax, legal, and regulatory updates (availability may vary by country and/or program) created during Premier Support and Extended Support (if offered and only after the Extended Support Period ends)
Upgrade scripts (availability may vary by program) created during Premier Support and Extended Support (if offered and only after the Extended Support Period ends)
Major product and technology releases, if and when made available at Oracle’s discretion, which may include general maintenance releases, selected functionality releases, and documentation updates.
Assistance with service requests, on a commercially reasonable basis, selected functionality releases, and documentation updates.
Access to the customer support systems specified in the Web-Based Customer Support Systems section below (24 x 7 web-based customer support systems), including the ability to log service requests online, unless stated otherwise.
Non-technical customer service during normal business hours.
Sustaining Support will receive Software Update License & Support limited to the following:
New program updates, fixes, security alerts, and critical patch updates.
New tax, legal, and regulatory updates.
New upgrade scripts.
Certification with new third party products/versions.
Previously releases, fixes, or updates that Oracle no longer supports.
Of course, a major downside to Sustaining Support is that resolution times for Severity 1 and Severity 2 level issues can take up to 30 calendar days. And that’s only if you experience these problems with your Oracle Forms and Reports software before a Premier or Extended Support deadline. You’re basically out of luck for a whole month. If you experience new problems that occur past the Premier and Extended Support deadlines, you’re out of luck completely.
| Severity Level | Response Time | Remote Restoration Time | Resolution Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| Severity 1 | 15 minutes | 6 hours | 30 calendar days |
| Severity 2 | 15 minutes | 48 hours | 30 calendar days |
| Severity 3 | N/A | N/A | 180 calendar days |
What Does this Mean for Your Organization?
The Oracle Lifetime Support policy update could sound like an okay deal to keep running your legacy infrastructure for another few years. However, placing an indefinite timeline on the lowest level of support will leave many enterprises that rely on Oracle Forms and Reports-based applications in the lurch.
With this policy update, Oracle is basically saying that it’s about time that you migrate to another solution, but we’ll keep your software running until you are ready. Oracle is not going to expedite features, support, or lifelines to Oracle Forms and Reports users, and IT Directors should continue to explore more options for application modernization, Forms migration, and digital transformation.
For all intents and purposes, Extended Support is the end of support. Sustaining Support does not provide the care, service, and coverage an enterprise needs to keep their mission-critical applications at peak performance.
Your organization needs more reassurance. You need access to the latest upgrades to your architecture—maintaining legacy systems with bare-bones support for much longer will do your organization a major disservice. You need the opportunity to take on new challenges and to increase your market share, and this level of uncertainty simply won’t cut it.
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