Improvements to Certero for IBM | 8.2 and above

From release 8.2 of Certero for IBM, a number of improvements and changes have been made to help improve the overall experience of managing your IBM effective license position (ELP).

Help Validate your ILMT Coverage

Improvements have been made to IBM inventory which now focuses on ILMT, as management of ILMT is critical to managing your IBM ELP. These improvements include:

• Additional attributes on the ILMT agent deployed on computers

• Help to identify where ILMT agents may no longer be reporting into ILMT

• Identification of out-of-date ILMT agents, again, an important part of managing ILMT

• Identification of ILMT agents that have been configured for different ILMT server(s)

• Helping to identify where ILMT agents may be missing from computers that have IBM software installed

This improvements help you to manage your ILMT deployment more effectively and ensure you are meeting your contractual requirements with IBM.

ILMT Compliance Position

From release 8.2, there is no longer a need to maintain two ELP positions as there is now a single ELP position based on the ILMT inventory. The IBM Compliance screen also includes a new drill down capability on the required quantity, as in the example below.

This provides a detailed breakdown of the virtual machines and hosts that make up this position, thus assisting with license optimizations.

Gap Analysis Data Grid

For most customers wanting to take advantage of IBM's sub-capacity licensing, there is a contractual requirements for you to measure Sub-Capacity PVU and VPC metrics using ILMT.  Example of where this contractual requirement may not be met are:

• Failing to install the ILMT agent on the relevant computers

• Problematic and/or misconfigured ILMT agents

Certero for IBM now has a new IBM Inventory > Gap Analysis data grid can be used to help you identify ILMT deployment issues to ensure the IBM ELP is an accurate reflection of the current position. This data grid is populated by identifying indicators of IBM software based on the Certero Inventory data collected. This uses Rules that can be updated by clicking on the Rules icon on this screen.

Note that for this data grid to be populated, please ensure that the Certero Client Agent used for computer inventory is version 8.2.x.x or above.

The objective of this data grid is to help you create an 'action plan' against problematic ILMT agents - those that need to be installed (as they are missing on the computer) or fixed (as they are not reporting into ILMT correctly). Once the ILMT agent is installed and correctly reporting into ILMT, it will automatically disappear from this data grid.

For those exceptions where you can confirm the ILMT agent is not required, the entry on this data grid can be excluded and a reason given.

Support for Virtual Processor Core Metric

From release 8.2, the option to determine your ELP using the VPC metric has been added to Certero for IBM.

User IBM Software > Licensable, you can now mark products as licensable and pick the VPC metric.

For IBM products licenses under the VPC Sub-Capacity metric:

• Go to the IBM Software > Licensable screen

• Click New at the top right of the screen

• Search and select the product in the list, for example, "MQ 7.5"

• Select the VPC Metric and click OK

• Find the new product with the VPC License Type

• Right-Click and select Add Agents

Select the agents and products in the list that you want to change from PVU to VPC and click OK

This will move the agents from PVU to the VPC metric

• Once all the changes are complete, right-click and confirm the changes

• Where the PVU metric is no longer used, it will disappear out of the list

Software Identification Paths

When you view at the IBM Software > Licensable screen and click on Agents, it will show the paths and evidence that ILMT has used to identify the product:

You can also exclude agents in this screen and give a reason for exclusion, for example:

• False Positive

• Cold Standby

• ...etc...