How To Monetise & Bill CloudStack - A Practical Open Approach
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This document outlines a presentation on monetizing and billing for CloudStack. It discusses what resources can be monetized in CloudStack including VMs, networks, storage, and services. It also covers possible billing models and processes including subscription, metering usage, rating usage, invoicing, payments, and dunning. The presentation provides examples of how to map resources to plans, collect usage data from CloudStack, and apply rates to generate invoices.
How To Monetise & Bill CloudStack - A Practical Open Approach
- 1. CloudStack Collaboration Conference 2022 14-16 November 2022 / Sofia, Bulgaria / 1 How To Monetise & Bill CloudStack A Practical Open Approach K B Shiv Kumar / CTO@IndiQus www.apiculus.com
- 2. CloudStack Collaboration Conference 2022 14-16 November 2022 / Sofia, Bulgaria / 2 Introduction ● This is a Techno-Functional Talk ● Focuses on CloudStack and Billing ● Laid out in a Questions and Suggestion Format
- 3. CloudStack Collaboration Conference 2022 14-16 November 2022 / Sofia, Bulgaria / 3 What All Can We Monetize? ● VM – Disk, CPU, RAM, OS ● VPC – VPC, VR CPU, VR RAM, VR Throughput, Data Transfer ● Networks – Count, Type, Throughput ● VPN Users – Count ● Rules – Firewall Rules, Port Forwarding Rules, Static Routes ● IP – Count ● Containers – Nodes, Count, Size ● Secondary Storage – Data Usage, Period of Storage ● Data Transfer – Account Level ● Services – Managed Services, Professional Services
- 4. CloudStack Collaboration Conference 2022 14-16 November 2022 / Sofia, Bulgaria / 4 What Billing Models Are Possible? ● Invoicing Perspective ○ Postpaid ○ Prepaid ● Period Perspective ○ Monthly ○ Quarterly ○ Annually ● Offering Perspective ○ Contractual (mo/qtr/yr) ○ One Time ○ Pay As You Go(PAYG) ● Aggregation Perspective ○ Account Level ○ Resource Level 4
- 5. CloudStack Collaboration Conference 2022 14-16 November 2022 / Sofia, Bulgaria / 5 How Do We Offer Services? ● Plans ○ Smallest Atomic Unit of Service ○ Priced (Recurring, One Time, Fixed or Variable) ○ Has Inclusions Optionally ○ Has Limits ○ Can be of type One Only, Always One, Many ● Catalogues ○ It’s a Menu Card ○ Can be Multiple – Regional/Customer Type/Account Specific/Sectoral ○ Price Override is Done Here ○ Selective Offerings are Possible
- 6. CloudStack Collaboration Conference 2022 14-16 November 2022 / Sofia, Bulgaria / 6 What Are The Billing Processes? ● Subscribing – Entering into a Contract for a Resource. ● Mediating – Collecting, Normalizing, Adjusting and Aggregating the Usage Data. ● Rating – Rating of that Resource Usage Data. ● Invoicing – Billing Users Periodically on the Charges Incurred Above. ● Apportioning – Processing Payments and/or Advances. ● Dunning – Steps to Recovering Dues.
- 7. CloudStack Collaboration Conference 2022 14-16 November 2022 / Sofia, Bulgaria / 7 How Do All These Fit In? Select Offering From Marketplace Create Resource In CloudStack Identify and Map The Applicable Plan Generate & Record Contract Collect Usage Mediate and Adjust Rate and Store Invoice Receive Payments Apportion Payments Implement Dunning
- 8. CloudStack Collaboration Conference 2022 14-16 November 2022 / Sofia, Bulgaria / 8 How Do We Subscribe/Contract? ● Plan Mapping ○ Identify Unique Plan(s) and Price ○ Zero-in via Combination (CPU, RAM, disk, OS, Zone, Region, Account, Bill Type etc.) ○ Plan can be a Monolith(VM) or Smaller (Compute, Disk, Network, OS) ○ Identify Billing Details (Fixed/Variable; Monthly/Hourly; OTC/Recurring) ○ Plan Should Map to the Correct Service Offering, Disk Offering, Template Offering, Zone, Region etc. in CloudStack. Tags, Tags, Tags! ○ Use CloudStack Identifiers for above - UUID, Name, Description, DB ID - All Work Fine ● Contracting/Subscribing ○ Store Plan Rate & Unit – Can be at Plan Level or Component level ○ Store Date, Period, Un-billed charges and Line Items (Consider Pro-ration vs Full) ○ Store Contract Type ○ Store Allowances (Consider Period, Unit, Quantity, Pro-ration) ○ Store the CloudStack Resource Identifier (UUID, Tags, DB ID - All Work Fine) ○ Store Custom Metadata if Required ○ Use Any Entry Point (CMP, AMQP, Events, Poll - All Work Fine)
- 9. CloudStack Collaboration Conference 2022 14-16 November 2022 / Sofia, Bulgaria / 9 How Do We Collect Data? ● cloud_usage DB and CloudStack Usage API are Your Best Friends! ● It is Recommended to Use Separate Collectors for Separate Types of Resources. ● Collect Periodic Usage for all Rateable Resources(VM, Disk etc.) or Resource Components(CPU, Network, DT etc.) ● Make sure to Obtain the Resource Identifier as Stored in the Contract. Most Important! ● This can be done via DB Queries or using CloudStack Usage API and Relevant Resource APIs or a Combination of Both Approaches. ● UUID can be found in almost all CloudStack API Responses while Resource’s DB ID is Present in usage_id Column of cloud_usage.cloud_usage Table.
- 10. CloudStack Collaboration Conference 2022 14-16 November 2022 / Sofia, Bulgaria / 10 Important Settings For Hourly Usage Tracking ● Usage Related Settings In CloudStack enable.usage.server usage.sanity.check.interval usage.execution.timezone usage.stats.job.exec.time usage.stats.job.aggregation.range usage.aggregation.timezone ● For Hourly Usage Set usage.stats.job.aggregation.range as 60.
- 11. CloudStack Collaboration Conference 2022 14-16 November 2022 / Sofia, Bulgaria / 11 How Do We Mediate? ● Aggregate at Resource, Period & Granularity Level ○ GROUP BY usage_id, start_date, end_date if using DB. Make sure to join resource tables to obtain identifier used in the contract. ○ Pass start_date, end_date and type if using the listUsageRecords API. ● Aggregate Resource Usage at the Account Level Where Required ● Map Each Resource ID to the Corresponding Contract ● Obtain the Pricing and Allowances (if any) ● Reduce the Usage by the Allowance Balance ● Provide Final Quantity and UOM for Final Rating
- 12. CloudStack Collaboration Conference 2022 14-16 November 2022 / Sofia, Bulgaria / 12 How Do We Rate? ● Apply the Contract Rate on Final UOM ● Better To Rate Till 4 Decimals ● Store in Un-billed Charges Against the Contract ● Aggregate on a Resource or Component Level 12
- 13. CloudStack Collaboration Conference 2022 14-16 November 2022 / Sofia, Bulgaria / 13 How Do We Invoice/ShowBack/ChargeBack? ● Needs to Run Every Bill Cycle ● Can be run Everyday ● Aggregate all Un-billed Charges at Contract Level ● Normalize Here for Percentile Billing ● Apply Taxes as Applicable ● Mark Un-billed Charges as Processed
- 14. CloudStack Collaboration Conference 2022 14-16 November 2022 / Sofia, Bulgaria / 14 How Do We Implement Dunning? ● Plays Around the Following Parameters ○ Exposure Limit ○ Unbilled Charges ○ Due Date ○ Payment Amount ○ Outstanding ● Rules may be a Combination of Above ● Actions Can Be ○ Notify – Email, SMS, CMP ○ Curtail Exposure – Set CloudStack Limits ○ Reversible Block – Disable In CloudStack ○ Permanent Removal - Delete Account In CloudStack
- 15. CloudStack Collaboration Conference 2022 14-16 November 2022 / Sofia, Bulgaria / 15 Use Case - Hourly Billing Of A VM User Chooses A VM Config Ex: 2Core, 4GB, 100GB Ubuntu 20.04 This Is Mapped To A Plan Ex: ‘Classic’ VM With Ubuntu 20.04 Plan Contains Service Offering, Disk Offering and Template Mapping Ex: serviceoffering=<uuid>; templateid=<uuid> Resource Created In ACS And UUID/Tag/DB ID Obtained Ex: deployVirtualMachine Identifier(s) Stored In Contract Ex: cloudstack_resource_uuid Field Allowed Usage Stored In The Contract Ex(24 Hrs/mo Free) VM Usage Collected Perioddically Ex: Join cloud_usage.usage_id With cloud.vm_instance.id Locate Contract’s Components Via Identidfiers Ex: VM’s UUID, Template UUID, Disk UUID Absorb Usage Till 24 Hours Ex: Put Value as 0 Till 1st 24 Hours Rate Individual Components Based On Rate Ex: VM @ USD 0.01/hr; OS @USD 0.02/hr Store Un-billed Against Contract and Period Ex: VM XYZ 14Nov2022 15:00 to 16:00 0.01 Aggregate All Unbilled Per Resource Ex: VM XYZ 1Nov to 30 Nov USD 696 Apply Percentile If Any Apply Taxes Generate Invoice
- 16. CloudStack Collaboration Conference 2022 14-16 November 2022 / Sofia, Bulgaria / 16 Thank You! “Ask no questions and you’ll be told no lies” – Great Expectations, Charles Dickens K B Shiv Kumar / Chief Technology Officer @IndiQus Technologies shiv@indiqus.com / shiv@apiculus.io / (91) 9810 527 448