Ubuntu Pro for Official Ubuntu Community Members(?)

I have read through the Ubuntu Member "Perks", and one of the newer perks is free Ubuntu Pro coverage for 50 machines. I read through announcement (https://ubuntu.com/blog/ubuntu-pro-beta-release), doc's, FAQ... For personal use, it is now free for 5 machines. For Ubuntu Member's Ubuntu Pro coverage is for 50 machines.

Where it mentions Ubuntu Members, it points to the Ubuntu Member main page/applications page. There in the Perks link, it mentions the Ubuntu Pro Perk, but nowhere does it mention how to implement that perk as an Ubuntu Member. Not even in the Ubuntu Pro FAQ's.

Does anyone know what that process is yet? And has anyone written a Wiki or Help Page for Ubuntu Member's on how to do that yet?

I went to the Ubuntu Pro Pricing page, where I knew they had a LiveChat Dialog and asked one of their "Solution Agents" who then tried to link me to instructions on how to apply to be an Ubuntu Member... LOL

I explained again that I have been an active Official Ubuntu Community Member since I was voted in as in 2012, and what is the process to claim my Ubuntu Member type Ubuntu Pro subscription. I was then asked for the email associated with my Ubuntu One account, so that a "Customer Success Representative" could research that and get back to me on that via email.

I am thinking it may be a subscription change with Ubuntu Pro, associated with the Ubuntu One account. The Ubuntu Pro dashboard comes up with that account, when you visit ubuntu.com/pro.

I may be suffering from the early hour or a "senior moment" but "up to 50 machines" sounds like more than "personal use". Are we eligible to implement this in the enterprise ... provided, of course, that we could find out how to implement it?

I wonder if there is some sort of secret Canonical handshake we were not taught? And why, oh why, did they not ask for your Ubuntu email address, since that would generally indicate you are a member? Derp?

Asking for my Ubuntu One email address made sense to me, because then they could trace it to an the account. My Ubuntu email address is actually tied back to that same email address, but they didn't ask for that.

The person initially followed his script... and after I re-explained it to him realized it did end in a loop with no answer. He then asked me to wait while he asked someone for more information. He ended up in a dead end also. So it got passed to a different level.

I have to admit, I have a Workstation in the den, a Raspberry Pi in the living room, and 2 laptops. Each runs KVM as virtual hosts for testing. Even then, I don't see ever using 50 machines. For what? Livepatch? Really looking in to it, that is the only perk from that from a free Ubuntu Pro account.

Extended Service Maintenance for 10 years extends 5 years past the usual EOS... How does that affect our usual answers on the Forum that we support Releases until EOS? Usually I can't wait to upgrade a release on my own machines. I am not shy about answering questions about EOS releases, and urging people to upgrade their own. But free Ubuntu Pro (even for 5 machines) does include ESM.

QIII said: Are we eligible to implement this in the enterprise ... provided, of course, that we could find out how to implement it?

Non-personal use requires a paid plan.

QIII said: why, did they not ask for your Ubuntu email address

Presumably because there is no security there; anyone who knows your Ubuntu email address would be able to use it. Whereas your Ubuntu Single Sign-On (Open ID) would give the relevant security.

MAFoElffen said: For what? Livepatch? Really looking in to it, that is the only perk from that from a free Ubuntu Pro account.

Ubuntu Pro expands ESM from only the Main repositories to include the Universe repositories. So, that's a lot of extra packages being supported for an additional five years.

MAFoElffen said: How does that affect our usual answers on the Forum that we support Releases until EOS?

I don't think that it does. Ubuntu is supported for 5 years, after which you can elect to have an extra 5 years of security-only updates, free for personal use, paid for non-personal use. That advice hasn't changed; only the scope of supported packages.

Erm ... my post was really meant to be facetious, but I was probably too tired to make it work.

:)

MAFoElffen said: Does anyone know what that process is yet?

When you find out, please let us know how. (Having said that, I probably would use at most one of the 50!)

Update as of Oct 12, 2022:

I just got off a chat with another Ubuntu Pro Support Staff member. Previously I was told that I would be emailed by a Customer Support staff member to answer this process. That didn't happen. So I got on LiveChat and asked what was going on.

Seems I am the Guinea Pig for this. Meaning, no one has tried to claim this perk yet. I seem to be the first "Official Ubuntu Member" to ask for this perk. We discussed that once we find out what the process is found out, that an Ubuntu Wiki page should be written for instructions on how to do this (I can do that), so that the Perks section can point to instructions on the process for this (I can update the link to wiki instructions page). And that an Ubuntu Blog entry should also discuss the how to.

I was told that he would personally email me tomorrow afternoon on what he found out. I will post tomorrow on that update.

I'm thinking that "that" type of subscription either does not exist yet, or the facility to make that type of subscription available is hidden somewhere. No one I've contacted so far, connected with Ubuntu Pro seems to know yet on how to do this.

EDIT: Their support staff scripts point back to "How to become an Ubuntu Member", but not for how an Ubuntu Member can claim this type of subscription.

We're thinking that a screenshot of the member's launchpad.net page verifies if they are an active Ubuntu Member...

Update as of Oct 13, 2022:

I received emails from the Support Agent and someone from the Ubuntu Pro Internal teams. They verified that I am an "Official Ubuntu Member". They wanted to verify my email address for Ubuntu Pro... So that they can do this.

In my email to them, I reminded them that they need to provide me with their accepted process for claiming this type of subscription so that I can publish instructions for other Ubuntu Members to follow.

Waiting on these, so that I can test this type of subscription and then I will publish instructions for others to follow.

MAFoElffen said: Update as of Oct 13, 2022…

Thank you for being our guinea pig!

No new emails. Thinking it's Friday in this timezone, but the weekend in the rest of the world. I could send someone an email bugging them, though I'm not expecting any kind of news back until Sunday or Monday...

One thing one of them said didn't make sense. That my dashboard may only say that I have 5 eligible, but be able to use up to 50 machines. You would think that what is there would be somehow tied together. I told them I would test this once they give me a "Go..." (that it is ready to test).

I guess we will just see how it goes.

Update as of 22022.10.19

This is still vaporware and not locked down yet. I didn't get answers, except that they are working on it and trying to get their own people on the same page.

I asked today if Ubuntu Advantage with the rebranding as Ubuntu Pro, in the ARM64 repo's and supporting Arch arm64... I tested it while online while their support agent. It fell apart. LOL. I could install package 'ubuntu-advanatage-tools' from the arm64 repo's. It will attach/enroll an arm64 machine (or at least it reports as such)... but it does nothing. It does not show up as enrolled device in the Ubuntu Pro Dashboard, nor does the Ubuntu Pro CLI say that is has any services at all. In fact, it says that arm64 is not supported as an arch...

They said that they are escalating that to higher, but from my end, it does report that arm64 is "Not supported". LOL!!!

On the "Subscription" for Ubuntu Members... I told them I am waiting for the "Ready" from them (all of them on the same page) before I test if that subscription process works.

MAFoElffen said: Update as of 22022.10.19

Thanks for keeping us updated!

MAFoElffen said: On the "Subscription" for Ubuntu Members... I told them I am waiting for the "Ready" from them (all of them on the same page) before I test if that subscription process works.

When I first came across this thread, I tested it on a VM. I wanted to see how to add a machine and then remove the same machine. Removing the machine was easy: [FONT=courier new]sudo pro detach[/FONT]. Once done, it took around 24 hours for it to disappear from the dashboard. So, that was confusing — why didn't it disappear from the dashboard immediately? — but it worked.

My question is how to remove a machine via the dashboard where you can't remove the machine from the machine itself, e.g. if the hard drive has crashed? I guess that we can address this once you have your answers.

It's a "go". See attached screenshot of my Ubuntu Pro Dashboard.

The quote from the answer from Canonical

"Everyone can register for the free personal subscription for up to 5 machines. If you register (for Ubuntu Pro) with an email (address) associated with the Official Ubuntu Community list, then this limit goes up to 50 (machines). Unfortunately, they will not see the increased limit in the UI, but they can continue attaching machines, and this can go up to 50 (instead of 5)."

As you can see from the attachment, under Machines,it says "5". "Active Machines" it says "7"...

To address Paddy's first question, "Active Machines" shows how many different/unique machines with an Active Ubuntu Pro subscription were actively polling within the last 24 hours. So you added a machine, then detached it. It shows up for in the dashboard for 24 hours.

On the second question, that will be a mess. I know with helping people get Ubuntu Pro issues resolved, you detach, generate a new 'machine_id" then attach with that new generated machine_id... Logically, someone would have to audit the machine_id's of their current / active machines for Ubuntu Pro to resolve what should not be there, taking up a subscription.

I will see what I can do to update "our" Wiki on instructions. Canonical says they will publish a blog entry on this...

MAFoElffen said: It's a "go". … I will see what I can do to update "our" Wiki on instructions. Canonical says they will publish a blog entry on this...

That's brilliant, thank you!