cockroach demo --geo-partitioned-replicas --multitenant=true fails with license error (but not with --multitenant=false)

[andreimatei]

Epic: CRDB-14538

[andrei:~/src/github.com/cockroachdb/cockroach] park+ ± ./cockroach demo  --geo-partitioned-replicas
...
# Partitioning the demo database, please wait...
*
* ERROR: partitioning the demo database: pq: license for cluster(s) a97a31f4-71ef-4a2e-ad11-b76eaccc81e3 is not valid for cluster a97a31f4-71ef-4a2e-55d9-ada0d4e6b842

Notice that the two cluster IDs start the same.

(Btw, is --geo-partitioned-replicas how I'm supposed to get a multi-region demo these days?)

Jira issue: CRDB-15789

[ajwerner]

Is this still happening? We had an outage in the reg server which I think has been fixed.

[andreimatei]

Happening now on master.
Does the registration cluster really play a role in cockroach demo.

[ajwerner]

Does the registration cluster really play a role in cockroach demo.

Yes, I'm almost certain it does.

---

I think this might be related to #74005. Try adding --multitenant=false to your invocation. I don't think this affects 22.1 because we merged #78168.

[rickystewart]

Does the registration cluster really play a role in cockroach demo.

Unfortunately, yes.

[andreimatei]

I think this might be related to #74005. Try adding --multitenant=false to your invocation. I don't think this affects 22.1

Running with --multitenant=false works. So perhaps this is a dupe of a known issue? I'll let @ajstorm close or triage.

---

Does the registration cluster really play a role in cockroach demo.

Unfortunately, yes.

Waaa? Can we do something about that?
22.1, with --geo-partitioned-replicas and without an Internet connection indeed fails:

ERROR: unable to acquire a license for this demo
DETAIL: Enterprise features are needed for this demo (--geo-partitioned-replicas).

This seems silly to me. Are we doing anybody any favors by requesting these demo licenses?
@knz I see you've fixed the code around this in 2019, so perhaps you know more?
Without knowing what I'm talking about, it seems to me that, given that we want demo to sometimes have licensed features enabled for multi-region, maybe we should have it always have licensed features enabled without asking for a license.

[rickystewart]

Waaa? Can we do something about that?

I am strongly in favor of doing something to stop this, yes. We discussed it at the dev-inf team meeting on Tuesday. So far the feeling has been that there isn't anyone who's willing to own the functionality so everything just kind of sits in the current state. 🤷

The registration server has other core functionality like crash reporting (errors.cockroachdb.com) which should also be handled by a proper service.

[knz]

@ajstorm let's bring this up at the next MT meeting.

[knz]

maybe we should have it always have licensed features enabled without asking for a license.

FWIW, the current thinking is that yes, we could do that, but first we need our legal dept to make it clear to customers that they can't embed cockroach demo in their tech stack just to get a valid enterprise license.

[andreimatei]

Did anybody else but you bring the legal dept into this? :P
What prevents people from " embedding cockroach demo in their tech stack just to get a valid enterprise license" today, with the mechanic license acquisition? If anything, it seems to me that giving out these licenses blindly makes it seem more legit to use cockroach demo for whatever you want cause look - you have a license! Not that we should care what people do with cockroach demo, IMHO.

[ajstorm]

@ajstorm let's bring this up at the next MT meeting.

Are we sure that this is an MT issue? IIRC, we request a license in non-MT mode as well.

[andreimatei]

We do appear to always request a license, but failing to get one doesn't seem to be fatal unless --geo-partitioned-replicas is specified.

Adam, you haven't confirmed that --geo-partitioned-replicas not working at all on master is a known problem. If it is, feel free to close this if there's a dupe.

[ajwerner]

There's two different things being discussed in this thread:

1. cockroach demo --geo-partitioned-replicas --multitenant=true fails 100% of the time because we're requesting the wrong license. That's a multi-tenant issue. --multitenant=true is the default on master, hence the complaints.
2. Andrei's more general sadness that --geo-partitioned-replicas requests a license at all.

This issue is about 1) and not about 2). Andrei or perhaps Ricky or somebody can file a separate issue about 2).

[knz]

ok thanks so we can update the issue title.

I believe the license is requested properly but may not be applied properly where it needs to be. we need to investigate that

[andreimatei]

Friendly ping. Who's a good victim for this? :) I can't tell if it's a multi-region or a multi-tenant issue, but... @ajstorm you it?

[ajstorm]

Last I heard, @knz was on it. Raphael, feel free to flame me if I've got that wrong.