Finout’s CostGuard is a powerful tool for identifying areas within your infrastructure that are ripe for cost optimization. As cost optimization is always a high priority, CostGuard provides a comprehensive solution that is seamlessly integrated with the MegaBill.
With CostGuard, you can easily identify cost optimization opportunities that are relevant for your Virtual Tags, different teams, environments, and cost centers - All in one centralized location. This makes it easier than ever to streamline your cost optimization efforts and achieve maximum savings.
Moreover, CostGuard continuously scans your resources and costs and identifies potential cost-saving opportunities across a range of use cases. With this feature, you have everything you need to optimize your costs and improve your bottom line:
Almost every organization has resources that were provisioned but are no longer in use. Forgetting to switch off these Idle resources eats away at your tech budget.
Resources that are in use may be underutilized and exceed your current workload performance and capacity requirements. Rightsizing means that you can downsize these resources without compromising on your service levels.
Identifying resources that are regularly in use helps to identify potential savings that can be had by signing up for savings plans. The Commitment to using a resource for a specific amount over the agreed period can safely be made based on the CostGuard scans.
Finout helps guard against resource wastage and provides you with quick access to potential savings. You can drill down into the various scan reports to view a list of the resources that require tweaking to actualize the specific savings. CostGuard gives you the information, and the confidence, to modify your resourcing and save money.
The CostGuard feature is available out of the box and generally requires no configuration. If you need additional scans, please contact Finout.
The following potential cost savings are tracked automatically:
Cost Center | Use Case | Scan Name |
AWS | Commitment |
|
|
| EC2 - Compute Commitment |
|
| EC2 - Compute Commitment |
| Idle |
|
|
| EBS - Idle |
|
| EC2 - Idle |
|
| ElastiCache - Idle |
|
| ELB - Idle |
|
| RDS - Idle |
|
| S3 Idle - Bucket (Requests) |
| Rightsizing |
|
|
| EBS - gp2 |
|
| EC2 - Rightsizing |
|
| RDS - Rightsizing |
Kubernetes | Rightsizing |
|
|
| K8s - CronJob |
|
| K8s - DaemonSet |
|
| K8s - Deployment |
|
| K8s - ReplicaSet |
|
| K8s - StatefulSet |
How to View Potential Savings
Select CostGuard.
(Optional) Apply the required Filters.
(Optional) Select whether to view the type of potential savings: Idle, Rightsizing, or Commitment.
(Optional) Select the required Group By option.
To download a list of the potential savings, click and Download CSV. A list of the potential grouped monthly savings and the number of resources per group is downloaded.
To download a table of the monthly scans, in the Scans area, click Download CSV. A list of the monthly scans, with the scan names, cost centers, use cases, potential savings per scan, and number of resources per scan, is downloaded.
To view a specific scan, in the Scans pane, click on the scan report.
How to View Cost Scans
The key information appears at the top of the scan report, with the detailed resource information listed in the table below.
Select CostGuard.
Select the required cost scan in the Scans pane.
(Optional) Apply the required Filters.
(Optional) Click Additional Columns, select the required columns, and click Apply.
To sort the resources table, click on the required column name. Click again to sort in reverse order.
To view resources with a specific status, click the required status button.
To return to viewing all resources, click All Resources.
Apply any required column viewing options. These column viewing options do not affect the exported cost scan.
How to Export a Cost Scan
You can export the cost scan with the applied filters, visible columns, selected resource status, and in the visible sort order.
Select CostGuard.
Select the required cost scan in the Scans pane.
(Optional) Apply the required Filters.
(Optional) Click Additional Columns, select the required columns, and click Apply.
To view resources with a specific status, click the required status button.
To sort the resources table, click on the required column name. Click again to sort in reverse order.
Click the download icon. A CSV file is downloaded.
How to Create a Snapshot of a Cost Scan
You can create a link to a scan report. The link is copied to the clipboard.
Select CostGuard.
Select the required cost scan in the Scans pane.
Click Generate Report. The link is sent to the clipboard.
How to Manage the Resource Status
You can manage the status of each of the resources, allowing you to track whether or not you are working on it, have dismissed it, or are done. A resource starts with a New status. This can be updated to Working on it, Dismissed, or Done. You can view a list of all the resources that you are working on.
Select CostGuard.
Select the required cost scan in the Scans pane.
Select a resource and select a Status from the dropdown.
Select one or more resources and then click Change status and select the required status.
To view a list of all the resources that you are working on, click To Do.
How to Optimize Kubernetes Resources
The Finout CostGuard scans help you set the correct allocation of resources for Kubernetes. For detailed information on how Finout calculates the cost of a Kubernetes K8 pod, see How Finout Calculates K8s Costs.
The report allows you to play “what-if” analysis and view the costs and savings if you were to lower the requested memory or CPU to the maximum usage or by 10% (P90) or 20% (P80).
1. Select CostGuard.
2. Scroll down to the list of scans, and click the Cost Center column to easily locate the Kubernetes scans.
3. Click on a K8s scan, for example, K8s - Deployment.
4. Click to select a report.
5. The report covers the period of the last 14 days and includes:
Cost and waste for the resource over the period.
Breakdown of the Memory and CPU usage (Max, Average, and Min) versus the current request over the period.
6. To view the impact of reducing the requested memory by 10% (P90) or 20% (P80), click P90 or P80. The New waste and Potential savings are updated.
7. To view the impact of selecting the maximum memory (as recorded in the past 14 days), click Max. The New waste and Potential savings are updated.
8. Similarly, to view the impact of changing the number of cores, click Max P90 or P80. The New waste and Potential savings are updated.
8. To view the CPU/memory ratio for the resource, click the information icon.
9. To copy the configuration with the selected changes, click Copy to copy the JSON snippet to the clipboard.
Still need help? Please feel free to reach out to our team at [email protected].