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Metadata Billing

Issues

Summary

Allow OSIE to reference instance and image metadata within billing rules, enabling providers to apply charges based on metadata values.

This would allow service providers to automatically charge for certain workloads, appliances, or services without requiring manual classification.

Current Behaviour

Metadata cannot currently be referenced within billing logic, which limits the ability to automatically apply charges based on deployed workloads.

As a result, providers must implement workarounds outside of OSIE to classify and charge for certain types of deployments.

Problem

Service providers often need to apply charges based on the type of workload deployed, not just the compute resources used.

Examples include:

  • Virtual firewall appliances

  • Operating system licensing

  • Managed service add-ons

  • Backup services

Without the ability to reference metadata in billing logic, it becomes difficult to automatically apply these charges in a consistent and scalable way.

Desired Behaviour

Allow OSIE billing rules to reference metadata values associated with images or instances.

Example workflow:

  1. An image contains metadata:

firewall=fortinet

  1. When a VM is deployed from this image, the instance inherits the metadata.

  2. OSIE billing rules can reference the metadata value:

if metadata.firewall = fortinet
→ apply monthly charge

This allows automatic charging for workloads based on their metadata attributes.

Example Use Cases

This capability would allow providers to easily implement billing for services such as:

  • Firewall appliances (e.g. Fortinet images)

  • Windows licensing (e.g. os=windows)

  • Managed backup services (e.g. backup=yes)

Why This Matters

Metadata-driven billing would provide a flexible and scalable way for providers to:

  • Automate service-based billing

  • Reduce manual classification of workloads

  • Build more advanced service offerings on top of the platform

This capability would make OSIE significantly more powerful for service providers operating multi-tenant cloud environments.

Thanks!

Posted by Kevin.Pannell ·
Status: Completed1 comment

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Comments1

  • Kevin.Pannell

    •

    Mar 16

    Additional clarification

    In many OpenStack deployments (including ours), instances are commonly deployed using boot-from-volume workflows.

    In these scenarios the instance may not directly expose metadata from the original Glance image, as the VM is booted from a Cinder volume created from that image.

    To ensure billing rules remain reliable, it would be useful if OSIE billing logic could reference either:

    • instance metadata, or

    • metadata associated with the source image used to create the instance volume

    This would ensure metadata-based billing works consistently regardless of whether instances are booted directly from images or from volumes.