Support 'enterprise' license type

[peterschretlen]

The enterprise license type is currently supported and used by ECE and ECK, but is not recognized by Elasticsearch or other parts of the stack.

With elastic/elasticsearch#48510, Elasticsearch will add support for this type. Initially a call to the Get license API will return a platinum license when an enterprise license is installed for backward compatibility reasons. Future iterations will remove this behavior, and the enterprise value will be returned.

When this happens Kibana and its plugins will need to work with the new license level - recognizing it as a valid license type, and treating it in license checks as 'higher' than the platinum license (the enterprise feature set will be a superset of the platinum license)

License management in Kibana does not need to change as part of this issue. Since enterprise licenses are managed by ECE and ECK, license management will be disabled altogether in Kibana like it is in ESS.

[elasticmachine]

Pinging @elastic/kibana-platform (Team:Platform)

[mshustov]

Initially a call to the Get license API will return a platinum license when an enterprise license is installed for backward compatibility reasons.

Doesn't require any changes in Licensing plugin.

Future iterations will remove this behavior, and the enterprise value will be returned.

We should update Licensing plugin to add enterprise as a valid license type.

kibana/x-pack/plugins/licensing/server/constants.ts

Line 19 in 52f3481

platinum = 40,

Hopefully, we switch to the NP Licensing plugin and needn't sync these changes with the legacy plugin.

Also, all the plugins implement a minimal required license check in different ways. For those plugins that match to license type manually, we should add enterprise as a valid value.
For example here https://github.com/restrry/kibana/blob/a6d0b6018bcd9e1c7688465e91c0934d5f9cd422/x-pack/legacy/plugins/ml/server/lib/check_license/check_license.js#L37-L40

[joshdover]

The timeline here:

• Add support for this level in Kibana 7.6, use this period to test
• Elasticsearch will switch to exposing this in 7.7

[alisonelizabeth]

Also, all the plugins implement a minimal required license check in different ways. For those plugins that match to license type manually, we should add enterprise as a valid value.

@restrry can you confirm the platform team will be handling this change for all plugins?

[peterschretlen]

The logic changes for the new license in Kibana are small and straightforward enough I think it's better one person on the Kibana team owns the change for all plugins, pulling in reviewers from other app/solution teams for awareness and double checking the logic as needed. It's easier to coordinate and the changes all land at once.

@joshdover @alisonelizabeth preferably platform but if necessary I'm sure another team could take this.

[bytebilly]

Quick update: Elasticsearch will not reuse the existing enterprise license used by ECE, but a new one (also named enterprise) that will apply to the Stack only.

This probably doesn't change anything when getting the license information from the API (it will return enterprise), but it may change for the fields that it will contain, so if there are components relying on those fields they should be considered based on what they will be.

[mshustov]

@peterschretlen @bytebilly can we test the Kibana part somehow of we should wait for elastic/elasticsearch#48510 to be finished? Should we split the current task into 2 parts and test everything later?

[peterschretlen]

@restrry ES support for enterprise has been added in elastic/elasticsearch#49223, so should be able to test on master. 7.x should follow soon in elastic/elasticsearch#49474

[mshustov]

@peterschretlen I'm trying to figure out how to generate a proper license. I cannot use any of https://wiki.elastic.co/pages/viewpage.action?spaceKey=PM&title=Internal+License+-+X-Pack if I build from master locally

[bytebilly]

@restrry the current license portal is not able to generate stack enterprise licenses yet (related issue).

I think that you can create (and sign) a license, but it's still a manual temporary process.

[peterschretlen]

There is one used in the API test ( https://github.com/elastic/elasticsearch/blob/6ec22eb508135da3b6df59000f9be03130ca506b/x-pack/plugin/src/test/resources/rest-api-spec/test/license/30_enterprise_license.yml#L16 ) ? I don't know if would work for testing but might be worth a try.

[mshustov]

I think that you can create (and sign) a license, but it's still a manual temporary process.

Are there any docs describing the process ? @bytebilly

[bytebilly]

@restrry I think the best way to do it is to use a test license.

The final format will probably be slightly different, with max_nodes replaced by max_resource_units. I don't know if this is relevant to Kibana. As far as I know, license details are not shown in the UI (but I may be wrong).

[mshustov]

@peterschretlen Do we need a separate issue to update the docs? I'm concern about better wording and doc generation pipeline.

[bytebilly]

I updated https://github.com/elastic/dev/issues/1278#issue-504202939 with the latest information.

We'll have max_resource_units for enterprise licenses instead of max_nodes.

I also checked that the License Management app doesn't show the value for max_nodes, so there should be no visible changes in the UI for that.

[peterschretlen]

@peterschretlen Do we need a separate issue to update the docs? I'm concern about better wording and doc generation pipeline.

@restrry I'll create an issue. I see a few references like ...if you are using a Gold or Platinum license... that may be worth updating - is that your concern?

[mshustov]

@peterschretlen yes. I'm not sure whether we want to promote Enterprise license in docs, nor should we provide the full list of suitable licenses for each case.