IBM software licensing can be a very complex knot to untie.
While IBM does develop new products in house, many of its most
popular offerings (Cognos, Tivoli and ILOG, to name a few) are the
result of its active history of acquiring smaller publishers and
then continuing to offer their products under the IBM brand. As a
result, those publishers' licensing metrics sometimes are
incorporated (at least for a time) among the myriad other IBM
metrics under which IBM licenses its products. (A description of
different IBM license types is available here.)
Compounding the complication is the problem that arises when
owners of licenses for products published prior to an IBM
acquisition seek to expand their use of those products or to prove
their license positions in the event of an audit. In some
circumstances, IBM in the past has offered those licensees the
option of acquiring additional, "legacy" licenses under
the metrics that applied prior to the acquisition. However,
