Developer Edition is not the 180-day Evaluation Edition. I check the edition before treating a calculated date as an expiration.
A developer installed the free Developer edition and asked about activation. A query added 180 days to NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM’s create_date. It displayed an expiry date even when the edition wasn’t Evaluation.
SELECT SERVERPROPERTY('Edition') AS edition,
SERVERPROPERTY('ProductVersion') AS product_version,
SERVERPROPERTY('ProductLevel') AS product_level;Inspect the edition, then its actual terms
Developer Edition is licensed for development and testing. It doesn’t have Evaluation’s 180-day trial limit. A server principal’s creation date doesn’t establish installation time or license expiration.
Conditioning that calculation on an Evaluation label doesn’t fix the source of the timestamp. It still doesn’t establish the trial’s start. I wouldn’t use either account-based calculation to decide when an installation expires.
For Evaluation, I use supported setup and edition-upgrade information. An unrelated account timestamp isn’t a reliable substitute.
Reference: SQL Server 2016 editions.
Related reading
An account creation date is not an edition-expiry date, it is metadata about that account.
Published by Pinal Dave on SQLAuthority. More of my work at pinaldave.com.
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11 Comments. Leave new
Very helpful, thank you.
@davidreynolds816 – Thanks!
Bug fix: IF (@edition = ‘Enterprise Evaluation Edition’ OR @edition = ‘Enterprise Evaluation Edition (64-bit)’)
Need to account for (64-bit).
Sure. Will change soon.
Hi Pinal, what about SQL Developer Edition on Linux? Will expire?
Yes my 2017 Developer edition doesn’t start now.
I don’t know what to do now, upgrade again to Dev Ed didn’t work.
“`
2018-02-01 15:42:27.78 Server Microsoft SQL Server 2017 (RC2) – 14.0.900.75 (X64)
Jul 27 2017 08:53:49
Copyright (C) 2017 Microsoft Corporation
Developer Edition (64-bit) on Windows 10 Enterprise 10.0 (Build 15063: )
2018-02-01 15:42:27.78 Server UTC adjustment: 1:00
2018-02-01 15:42:27.78 Server (c) Microsoft Corporation.
2018-02-01 15:42:27.78 Server All rights reserved.
2018-02-01 15:42:27.78 Server Server process ID is 23700.
2018-02-01 15:42:27.78 Server System Manufacturer: ‘Hewlett-Packard’, System Model: ‘HP ZBook 15’.
2018-02-01 15:42:27.78 Server Authentication mode is MIXED.
2018-02-01 15:42:27.78 Server Logging SQL Server messages in file ‘C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL14.MSSQLSERVER\MSSQL\Log\ERRORLOG’.
2018-02-01 15:42:27.78 Server The service account is ‘NT Service\MSSQLSERVER’. This is an informational message; no user action is required.
2018-02-01 15:42:27.78 Server Registry startup parameters:
-d C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL14.MSSQLSERVER\MSSQL\DATA\master.mdf
-e C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL14.MSSQLSERVER\MSSQL\Log\ERRORLOG
-l C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL14.MSSQLSERVER\MSSQL\DATA\mastlog.ldf
2018-02-01 15:42:27.78 Server Command Line Startup Parameters:
-s “MSSQLSERVER”
2018-02-01 15:42:27.78 Server Error: 17051, Severity: 16, State: 1.
2018-02-01 15:42:27.78 Server SQL Server evaluation period has expired.
2018-02-01 15:42:27.78 Server SQL Server shutdown has been initiated
“`
SQL version is Microsoft SQL Server 2017 (RC2) which is pre-release version of SQL Server 2017 and that’s why its expired.
Great! They were both installed. I could uninstall rc2 now. Thanks!
On Linux what shows as Developer edition from the query above shows up as an evaluation edition when running /opt/mssql/bin/sqlserver –help
The response will give the number of days left or say that it has expired.
Set your system date back in time (either turn off time sync or just unplug the network) and then re-run.
This will then say x days left and show it is actually an evaluation,
Hacking system tables to change various dates and certificates I have locked up SQL so currently performing a clean build and restoring backups….
I think its true for pre-release versions.
The work around if your edition has expired (for the purposes of performing a backup / database detatch) is to disconnect the netrowk, set the date back in time to when it worked, start up sql and then re-connect the network. The date will change back but sql will not shut down immediately and still allow remote connections in.