There seems to be some general confusion surrounding the fact that EAS offer two enterprise architecture products – Essential Open Source, our open-source EA tool, and Essential Cloud, our commercial product.
What is Essential Open Source?
Essential Open Source is our open-source EA Management Tool, it is a different product from Essential Cloud.
Support
We support the open source EA tool on a best endeavours basis around our other work, we usually answer within a few days
Cost
Essential Open Source is free of charge – it can be downloaded from our website here
Licence
Essential Open Source is licensed under the GNU General Public License (GPL). This means that anyone is free to use it as is, and also to make their own changes to it. If the Essential toolkit is used internally within an organization there is no obligation to release any of that organisation’s changes. However, if you release the modified version to others outside of your organisation then you must make your changes available to all, and attribute the original code to EAS Ltd, under the GNU GPL license.
What is Essential Cloud?
As mentioned, Essential Cloud is our commercial EA tool, it is not an open-source tool.
Collaboration and Flexibility
Essential Cloud can be configured and customised easily, by the clients or by us (EAS), across the meta model, the views and the editors, to enable organisations to make it specific to their individual needs. The clients have an allocated account manager.
Support
Technical support for Essential Cloud is included in the license fee, so although the forums are available to share ideas and, potentially, new views, if there is a technical issue with Essential Cloud it is supported via our support desk. We prioritise these tickets over open source.
License and Cost
Essential Cloud is offered under commercial license for an annual subscription of, currently, ~$19,999 per year for unlimited enterprise architecture related data and unlimited users. So, whilst it is a low-cost tool, it is not free.
Find out more about Essential Cloud here
Do Essential Open Source and Essential Cloud have the same Capabilities?
Essential Open Source shares the meta model and most of the views with Essential Cloud, our commercial product, however the overall experience of the two tools is markedly different. The two major distinctions are:
- Data Capture: Essential Open Source requires some understanding of the meta model, whereas Essential Cloud provides easy to use editors that do not require this knowledge. You wouldn’t use Essential Open Source with non-technical users, whereas Essential Cloud is designed to be used by the wider organisation.
- APIs: Essential Cloud offers access to a suite of APIs, enabling seamless data transfer in and out of the platform.
A comparison is provided here
Essential Open Source is a great starter tool, often to prove the benefits of EA before rolling the commercial version out to a wider audience across the organisation. It is also great for smaller organisations that have no budget, even for the low-cost Essential Cloud product, however it is a quite technical implementation.
What is Essential Docker?
Essential Docker is our on-premise version of Essential Cloud. It has the same features and functionality and is also offered under a commercial license for an annual subscription. EAS provide a docker container and the client installs it on their platform.
Will Essential Open Source be discontinued now you have Essential Cloud?
No, we are committed to supporting Essential Open Source. It shares the meta model and the majority of the views with Essential Cloud, so it is continually updated and improved.
Essential Cloud has been around since 2017, and we are still updating and providing support for Essential Open Source. We have no plans to change this.
Why would I pay for Essential Cloud when Essential Open Source is free?
As mentioned, Essential Open Source shares the meta model and the views with Essential Cloud, however, the overall experience of the two tools is markedly different.
Essential Open Source is great for enterprise architects to use, but is, as mentioned, a technical tool which you would not put in front of business users for data capture. If you are looking to collaborate across your organisation, Essential Cloud provides features to allow you to do this, such as easy data capture, drag and drop modelling, APIs for integration with other tools and so on.
Want to Find out More?
If you are interested in a demo, or in finding out more about Essential then contact us here