
HPNZNB asked a question.
How to track IBM license consumption for containers in Flexera One?
Hello Flexera experts,
We would like to find a way to track IBM license consumption for containers? How can we do this in Flexera One? Is there an agent for container?
Thanks,
Peng
You will need to install the Kubernetes agent into the cluster and enable the IBM Licensing Service integration to bring in this data from the containers.
https://docs.flexera.com/flexera-one/it-assets/discovery/inv-set-page-intro/inv-set-agent-inv-download/inv-set-kub-agent-download/
Thanks for the response! So, we don't need install the agent on each Kubernetes server, just need install Kubernetes agent into the cluster?
You would install the Kubernetes agent to each cluster and it will handle collecting inventory from each image used to run a container
The Flexera Kubernetes Agent (KRM) will only give you data for those containers running within K8S clusters and only those clusters where the KRM is deployed (works on GKE, AKS, OCP etc as well). If you have IBM images deployed to a cluster then the IBM License Service component should already be enabled on that cluster. the KRM will talk to that IBM License Service to retrieve the consumption data. Where you have built images and thrown in IBM binaries the IBM License Service will not provide details unless certain annotations are applied to the containers.
For containers running on servers (such as via docker and not in a Kubernetes cluster), then the standard Flexera server agent can scan these when you enable Docker / Podman / ContainerD in the agent config in the F1 UI. I focus on discovery and don't concern myself with license stuff, but I believe the SW discovered inside the containers are not automatically considered for license consumption and therefore some manual mapping is needed in the UI. Maybe someone else can confirm and comment further on that.
For container scanning via either agent there are limitations to which images (therefore containers) it can scan. Essentially the Linux ndtrack.sh binary is injected into a running container to inventory the contents. Therefore images built without the minimum dependencies to run the ndtrack.sh binary are ignored. Or where a container is read only at runtime or read only filesystems (/tmp especially)
Thanks, Wevans! We have Flexera agent installed on all Kubernetes servers but not on the cluster. We have enabled the docket scanning.