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Abiquo usage metering

Abiquo usage metering

Both billing systems use the same Abiquo accounting services integration for usage metering

Integrated

Separate system. A separate install on a separate server was required. 

Documentation is now in the Abiquo infrastructure guide under Abiquo billing.

 You can configure billing in the UI and the Abiquo API runs billing and stores data in the Abiquo database. See Configure on premise billing. After you fully transition to on-premise billing, you can uninstall the old Abiquo billing integration.

Hourly usage per day, billed monthly from start to end of calendar month, with UTC time

Hourly, daily, weekly, or monthly, billed monthly on any day

The new monthly billing is simpler to use and follows the market standard. Pricing will still support old accounting periods for

billing with

previous pricing models.

Automatic billing of enterprises with pricing model

Map enterprises/

VDCs to accounts with SQL.

You can enter account IDs using enterprise properties

. You can push enterprise properties to VMs as variables.

Automatically use current enteprises for billing

Configure a job to maintain account mapping for enterprises or VDCs to bill

After you transition to the new billing, you can stop the abiquo-billing-mapping job 

Pricing with new cost codes to support custom usages and new price factors. The upgrade will convert price factors

Custom usages were created with custom MySQL and price factors were created with enterprise properties.

After you transition to

on-premise billing, you can remove the old enterprise properties for price factors

.

In API or DB.

In a coming version, Abiquo will introduce cost usage endpoints with reports for on-premise billing

Output to CSV, or DBMS

with CSV generator

In Abiquo 6.1, you can install (or continue to use) the Abiquo CSV generator to obtain a CSV file.

Integrated billing dashboards

Private billing module to populate dashboard

was installed separately

Before you enable on-premise billing, stop the abiquo-private-billing cron job 

Billing by usage only

Billing by usage or allocation

Billing by allocation

will be introduced in a future version

No hypervisor usage

Hypervisor usage

Hypervisor usage is deprecated 

Backup GB by backup size as standard usage

for billing for Veeam

Backup GB by VM size with custom billing configuration

The platform now stores Backup GB usage

as an accounting

usage. For billing, enable the Backup GB usage

New cost code types and cost code units. See Manage extra charges with cost codes and Manage enterprise products

Custom usage with MySQL

Note: In Abiquo 6.1.0 there is a known issue with accounting for one-time cost codes.  

Billing log output is in the API logs

Separate logs for com.abiquo.billing

You can configure the same log levels of

DEBUG

,

INFO

,

WARN

, and

ERROR

.

Cron job runs billing nightly. It is the same job as for integrated public billing.

Cron job runs billing each week

To configure the cron job

that runs on-premise billing

use an Abiquo

property.

When you transition to on-premise billing, you can stop the old abiquo-billing cron

job 

Easily generate billing for an enterprise

or reseller in the UI. Abiquo property limits billing generation per

enterprise/day

Regenerate billing with a script

The platform generates billing nightly, plus a user can generate once per day by default. You can configure the maximum number of times the user can generate billing with an Abiquo

property

Pricing history stores one price per month. The administrator can update the pricing for the month in the UI, which will also regenerate billing for the current month. If the administrator does not manually update pricing, new prices will apply in the next month

No pricing history. Billing is regenerated with current prices

In the Pricing view, the button is called Regenerate billing, because it will update prices and regenerate billing for the current month

You can regenerate billing in the user interface for an enterprise or selected reseller enterprises. The button to regenerate billing is on the Billing tab when you edit an enterprise. The process to regenerate billing uses the prices from the pricing history for the month

that you are regenerating billing for.

You can regenerate billing manually with a script. The platform regenerates all billing with current prices.

You can select an enterprise or a reseller and/or their customers to regenerate billing for, as for public cloud. Note: enter the correct period because if you enter a period with no usage, the platform may generate a standing charge and minimum charge.