Unexpected high usage and overlapping periods in the Virtual Machine History report observed upon configuring Usage Meter 3.6.x appliance in specific time zones

Products

• VMware Aria Suite

Issue/Introduction

Symptoms

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The Usage Meter reports are showing unexpected high usage values. The VM History, the Monthly Usage and the Customer Monthly Usage reports contain duplicated usage entries for the reported period. Due to these duplicate entries, the usage report values are doubled.



Cause

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The duplicated entries are caused by configuring the Usage Meter Appliance in a time zone, which rule for Daylight-Saving Time (DST) was changed after 17th April, 2014

List of affected Time Zones:
America/Brazil/Acre
America/Brazil/Bahia
America/Mexico/Eastern Standard Time - Quintana Roo
America/Turks & Caicos Island
America/United States/Alaska - Annette Island
America/Uruguay
Antarctica/Antarctica/Casey
Asia/China/xinjiang_time
Europe/Russia/MSK-01 - Kaliningrad
Europe/Russia/MSK+00 - Crimea
Europe/Russia/MSK+00 - Kirov
Europe/Russia/MSK+00 - Moscow Area
Europe/Russia/MSK+00 - Volgograd
Europe/Russia/MSK+01 - Astrakhan
Europe/Russia/MSK+01 - Saratov
Europe/Russia/MSK+01 - Ulyanovsk
Europe/Russia/MSK+02 - Urals
Europe/Russia/MSK+03 - Umsk
Europe/Russia/MSK+04 - Altai
Europe/Russia/MSK+04 - Tomsk
Europe/Russia/MSK+05 - Irkutsk, buryatia
Europe/Russia/MSK+06 - Lena river
Europe/Russia/MSK+06 - Tomponsky
Europe/Russia/MSK+06 - Zabaykalsky
Europe/Russia/MSK+07 - Amur river
Europe/Russia/MSK+07 - Oymyakonsky
Europe/Russia/MSK+08 - Magadan
Europe/Russia/MSK+08 - Sahka (E)
Europe/Turkey
Pacific Ocean/Norfolk Island
Pacific Ocean/Tonga

When configured with any time zone, outside of this list, the Usage Meter 3.6.x is reporting correctly.

Environment

VMware vCloud Usage Meter 3.6.x

Resolution

Impact / Risks

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Configuring the Usage Meter Appliance in any of the listed time zones can cause inaccurate reporting of vRAM consumption and may impact the monthly usage reports.


Resolution

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In case of the duplicate values in the reports, the SP's reported usage will be incorrect. The report the correct monthly usage:

1. Deploy a NEW Usage Meter 3.6.1 without migrating the data from the affected appliance.
2. Configure the appliance in a time zone that is outside of this list. We recommend using UTC Time Zone.
3. Use the NEWLY deployed Usage Meter appliance for reporting usage.
4. Keep the affected appliance for auditing purposes.
5. Raise a support request in order to pursue remediation for the affected months.

In order to avoid any incorrect reports on Usage Meter, we recommend using UTC Time Zone.