Support Terms

(*) Or as agreed between Crate.io and the customer on a ticket-by-ticket basis.
(**) Or as relevant progress occurs.

Working time represents the time during which Crate.io support team will work on the support request submitted by the customer. There is no guaranteed duration to solve the support request as the complexity and root causes of issues can vary.

Support cases will be handled in written form on the issue raised via the support portal. If suitable, Crate.io support engineers will ask customers for a video call to solve the problem together or clarify open questions. After such a call, the support issue will be updated to have the latest information documented.

Language

The primary language for support requests is English.
Support in other languages is provided on a best-effort basis and subject to staff availability.

Scope of Crate.io Support

Crate.io Support covers development and production issues for CrateDB Cloud (DBaaS), CrateDB Edge and CrateDB on-premises deployments, covering situations such as (examples only):

• Troubleshooting issues with the Crate.io products (CrateDB, CrateDB Cloud, CrateDB Edge),
• Troubleshooting well-defined situations where the documented, public APIs do not behave as documented,
• Issues with our consoles (such as the CrateDB Admin UI or the Cloud Console) and the use-cases supported by them (e.g., deployments, scaling/up down, managing security, performance monitoring),
• Troubleshooting operational or system-related problems with CrateDB Cloud (DBaaS),
• Problems detected automated by the monitoring of Crate.io,
• Providing advice on database schema setup, best practices for integration with our official database clients and generic questions on the products.

• Hands on installation of CrateDB Edge on the customers infrastructure,
• Developing applications for the customer or answering questions on the customers application architecture,
• Debugging applications,
• Analyzing and troubleshooting the performance of applications or infrastructure
• Analyzing and troubleshooting customizations made to supported components obtained from Crate.io as samples which were modified by the customer,
• Analyzing and troubleshooting non-supported community-maintained components and tools obtained from Crate.io,
• Performing system administration tasks (including network tasks and troubleshooting networking issues) on on-premises installations.

Additionally, Crate.io shall have no obligation to support:

• Any other software installed in companion with CrateDB on the same or neighboring systems, as well as software interfaces that are not supported by Crate.io;
• Problems caused by Customer’s negligence, abuse or misapplication or use of the Software other than as specified in the Documentation, in the Licensing Information or other causes beyond the control of Crate.io.

Additionally, Crate.io reserves the right to change the used product configuration for CrateDB Cloud Clusters if needed. In that case, the customer will be informed before the new product configuration will be of the similar or better performance, for the underlying use case. This will only be done, if the old cluster configuration is no longer supported.

The expected behavior and correct usage of Crate.io products are documented in our public documentation.

Help Us Help You

The customer is expected to manage “First Line Support” services for all systems, services and applications provided to their own users (L1). This customer-handled support shall be able to provide direct responses to all requests raised by users regarding the software, including issues relating to performance, functionality, configuration, and operation.

If, after reasonable commercial efforts, the customers own support is unable to diagnose or resolve problems or issues in the software or Cloud/SaaS service, Crate.io may be contacted for “Second Line Support” (L2). The customer must use all commercially reasonable efforts to provide Crate.io with the necessary access and resources required (e.g., access to servers, copies of on-disk data stores, log files, insights into how the customer utilizes Crate.io products or services etc.) to verify that observed issues originate in the software or service provided and for Crate.io being able to provide Second Level Support. Crate.io Support may escalate issues further to our product development teams (L3) for assistance if required and deemed necessary.

If access to the customer's systems cannot be provided, or issues cannot be replicated due to limited information provided, Crate.io will be unable to guarantee the quality of support and cannot be held accountable for delays in resolution.

To speed up the troubleshooting of problems, the customer needs to ensure to include the below information when reporting an issue:

• Customer Name: the owner of Crate.io product with the problem,
• The version of the Crate.io product the customer is using (if on-premises) or the URL to the database service / SaaS service the customer is referring to,
• The problem the customer is experiencing, and steps to reproduce the problem,
• Assessment of the severity level of the problem and why.
  

The customer needs to ensure to accurately explain the problem that is experienced so that Crate.io support engineers can help solve the problem quickly. Also, the customer must ensure availability in case Crate.io support engineers need further direct assistance for troubleshooting during working times (according to Severity and Setup, see “Working time”).

Software Updates

• Patches are maintenance updates that include defect fixes and, occasionally, minor new features.
• Minor versions are evolutionary updates that introduce significant improvements and changes. They may include breaking changes, affecting existing applications depending on Crate.io products.
• Major versions are used to deliver significant changes to the products of Crate.io. They may include breaking changes, affecting existing applications depending on Crate.io products.
  
  

CrateDB Cloud / Edge customers will receive information on new software and are able to schedule minor/major software updates of their environments with Crate.io Support (see “CrateDB Cloud Scheduled Maintenance”).

Additionally, CrateDB Edge customers will have to take care of upgrading the components of their Edge installation themselves. Customers of CrateDB Edge are responsible for updating their Kubernetes Infrastructure to meet the requirements documented by Crate.io.

When a version of the Crate.io software reaches the end of mainstream support, Crate.io will inform the affected customers and organize the mandatory upgrades of the CrateDB Cloud / Edge environments to a supported version.
Customers with on-premises environments are responsible for updating those environments and their applications. Customers can find the latest Software Updates via the common package managers or at https://cratedb.com/download. Customers may also request an application upgrade service from Crate.io or from one of our partners (fees are not included with the Support subscription).

Customers should always plan their updates carefully to have a minimal business impact. When a Software Update impacts existing applications, Crate.io will provide a technical note with update strategies as part of release notes. See https://cratedb.com/docs/crate/reference/en/latest/appendices/release-notes/

CrateDB Cloud Scheduled Maintenance

From time to time, Crate.io will perform maintenance on the CrateDB Cloud / SaaS services of our customers. These maintenance tasks update the software to ensure you benefit from new capabilities and defect fixes. In the event of Scheduled Maintenance:

• Crate.io will use commercially reasonable efforts to notify Customers with at least 2 business days in advance.
• Crate.io will notify all technical contacts associated with the company via email or service info ticket.
• If the maintenance task has an impact on customers use of Crate.io’s services (e.g., downtime of the core database offering or related service required for the customer to fulfill their services), upon request Crate.io will reschedule the maintenance task. **

(**) For example, the deployment of a CrateDB Hotfix in the CrateDB Cloud/SaaS service is usually performed as a rolling update to the database services, not requiring a downtime. A minor/major release upgrade of the database service may impact the customers’ application, requiring testing of the full software stack – hence this is a task that Crate.io offers to reschedule.

End of support for older software versions

Crate.io releases minor or major feature updates approximately every quarter. During these periods, patch updates are issued every 2-6 weeks, based on demand and Crate.io's discretion. 

Crate.io provides regular support and updates for major and minor versions for 1 year from their initial release, as noted in the release notes. 

• Only the latest released minor version receives patch updates by default until it is replaced by a new version;
• Updates for older supported versions may be provided upon customer request or at Crate.io's discretion;
• When a software version is discontinued, Crate.io stops releasing updates for that version. While updates, especially security updates, may still be provided at Crate.io's discretion, they are not guaranteed;
• Customers with a valid subscription can still open support tickets for discontinued versions, but:
  • Crate.io cannot guarantee a response within the defined SLA,
  • Solutions may only include advice or workarounds,
  • Fixes will only be provided for supported versions, requiring customers to upgrade,
  • The availability SLA for Crate.io Cloud/Edge may not be guaranteed. 

Example: 
CrateDB 5.7.0 
- released date 2024-04-05 
- support EOL: 2025-04-05 

We recommend regularly updating to the latest versions to benefit from performance improvements and new features.