[Azure] [Billing] Find a migration path for Usage Details API

[zmoog]

Context

On July 2022, Microsoft made Cost Details API generally available for EA and MCA customers.

Azure is positioning Cost Details API and Exports as the go-to solutions for cost details (formerly referred to as usage details).

With this release, the Usage Details API (used in the Azure Billing metricset) will be retired:

"Consumption Usage Details API is no longer actively being developed. We strongly recommend migrating off these APIs as soon as possible."

The July 2022 blog post does not mention a specific date yet:

"A retirement announcement will be made in the future with formal timelines for when the APIs will be turned off. However, the APIs will be fully supported from a reliability standpoint until the formal retirement date is reached."

Challenges

In the "Benefits of the new solutions" section of the blog post, Microsoft says that "new solutions are asynchronous", so they are far from being a drop-in replacement.

Migration

Microsoft published a document called Migrate from Consumption Usage Details API that outlines possible alternatives, benefits, and fields mapping.

Goals

We must analyze and plan the best possible migration path to continue to support usage details data in the Azure Billing metricset when Microsoft will discontinue the Usage Details API.

[lalit-satapathy]

@SubhrataK,

Any details on the priority of the usage details / billing integration?

[zmoog]

@lalit-satapathy, I created a support request asking, "When will the Usage Details API be retired?"

Here are the most relevant quotes from the Azure Support response:

First, we don't really know when the deprecation is happening even internally. However, I do know that Microsoft will provide enough time for our customers to migrate to the new APIs after the announcement.

So we don't have an EOL date yet.

With that being said, I strongly recommend starting to think about the migration now because the legacy APIs won't have updates or even bug fixes.

This is an aspect to consider: no updates to the legacy Usage Details API (the API we are currently using).

If that's the one that you were talking about, then I would recommend you to think about the migration since the Generate Cost Details Report API is a new API which gives the csv file in the blob storage, which is totally different then the legacy Usage Details API which gives you the JSON response.

The migration could take some time and even design change, but that would be a better solution and could be a one-time thing.

This upgrade may be more expensive than the average API upgrade or migration because there's a good chance it will require a design change in the metricset.

[SubhrataK]

@zmoog Thanks for sharing the info. This is really helpful!

@lalit-satapathy Let's park this in our backlog for now. We will plan it in a future release based on the priority.