IBM FlexPoints
Available from 9.2.13. IBM FlexPoint is a license metric
unit that can be used to determine the cost of IBM products that are purchased as part of
FlexPoint bundles. Each product from a bundle is licensed based on a different license
metric but all metrics are converted into FlexPoints. The conversion is based on the
specific calculations. PVU and RVU software that is assigned to a FlexPoint bundle, must be
licensed based on subcapacity rules. Products that are currently available as part of
FlexPoint bundles are products from the IBM Cloud and IBM Analytics brands.
Predicting the number of required IBM FlexPoints
To predict the number of FlexPoints that are required to license products in your environment, you can use IBM FlexPoint Calculator. For each product that you are planning to deploy as part of a FlexPoint bundle, specify the number of license metric units. The numbers are then converted into FlexPoints and summed up.
Example
The following example describes how the number of FlexPoints that are used in your environment is counted by BigFix Inventory BigFix Inventory. The calculations are based on sample values and should be treated only as an example.| Product | Used license metrics | IBM FlexPoints per license metric unit | Calculations |
|---|---|---|---|
| UrbanCode Deploy Server Agent | 2 Virtual Servers | 129,800 | 2 x 129,800 = 259,600 |
| Rational Test Workbench | 50 Authorized Users | 15,950 | 50 x 15,950 = 797,500 |
| Rational Test Virtualization Server | 210 PVUs | 2,893 | 210 x 2,893 = 607,530 |
| Total FlexPoints Used | 1,664,630 | ||
Reading metric utilization
Information about IBM FlexPoint bundles
You can view information about IBM FlexPoint bundles on the IBM FlexPoints and IBM Cloud Paks report. The report lists the IBM FlexPoint bundles based on the decisions that you make during software classification. The metric quantity represents the license metric utilization for an entire bundle over the specified period of time expressed in IBM FlexPoints.
Information about the products that contribute to IBM FlexPoint bundles
To view the detailed report with license metric utilization for individual products that are parts of a bundle, go to the Cloud Pak or FlexPoint Bundle report, and click the FlexPoint bundle name in the Product Name column. The detailed information include the peak date of the entire FlexPoint bundle and the number of FlexPoints used by each individual product. Additionally, you can check the number of original metric units by which the products are licensed that are used over the reporting period.
You can change the metric quantity for the products that contribute to
the bundle. Once you set the declared metric quantity for a product that is a
part of a FlexPoint bundle, the number of the FlexPoints for the entire bundle
is automatically adjusted. For more information, see: Setting and removing the declared metric quantity.
Information about FlexPoints in audit snapshot
When you generate the audit snapshot, information about FlexPoint
bundles and the number of FlexPoints that they use is contained in the
flexpoints.csv file. The file additionally contains
information about the software products within the bundle and the number of
FlexPoints used by them.
| Row No. | Publisher | Product Name | FlexPoint or Cloud Pak Bundle | Metric | Metric Quantity | Peak Date | Bundle Metric Contribution | Imported Part Numbers | Recalculation Needed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | IBM | Cloud DevOps - Perpetual | None | FlexPoint | 139,073 | 06/14/2019 | No | ||
| 2 | IBM | IBM Rational ClearCase | Cloud DevOps - Perpetual | Floating User | 20 | 06/14/2019 | 136,400 | No | |
| 3 | IBM | IBM Rational ClearQuest | Cloud DevOps - Perpetual | Authorized User | 1 | 06/14/2019 | 2,673 | No |