Deploying enterprise software often involves additional steps to ensure license compliance. In earlier versions of IBM Business Automation Manager Open Editions (BAMOE), compliance with IBM License Metric Tool (ILMT) requirements involved manually patching container annotations across deployments. This added operational overhead and increased the potential for configuration inconsistencies.

With BAMOE 9.4.0, this process has been simplified. Product-specific Helm charts now include automatic ILMT annotations, enabling compliant deployments without manual configuration.

The Challenges Addressed

In previous BAMOE releases, customers used generic Helm charts and manually added ILMT annotations after installation. This approach introduced several operational challenges:

• Additional setup effort: Manual patching after deployment added extra configuration steps to each installation, extending overall deployment time.
• Risk of configuration errors: Missing or incorrect annotations could result in incomplete or inaccurate license tracking.
• Compliance uncertainty: Inconsistent annotation coverage increased the effort required during license audits and compliance reviews. Based on customer feedback, this workflow has been improved in BAMOE 9.4.0 through enhancements to the Helm chart architecture.

Before vs. After: Manual vs. Automated ILMT Compliance

The Solution: Product-Specific Helm Charts with Automated ILMT Annotations

BAMOE 9.4.0 introduces product-specific Helm charts that include the required ILMT compliance metadata by default. Instead of a single generic chart, users now select a chart aligned with the licensed product, with annotations applied automatically during deployment.

New Helm Chart Structure

• Development environment charts

• • dmoe-dev-environment-helm-chart – Decision Manager Open Edition
  • pamoe-dev-environment-helm-chart – Process Automation Manager Open Edition

• Runtime environment charts
  • dmoe-runtime-environment-helm-chart – Decision Manager Open Edition
  • pamoe-runtime-environment-helm-chart – Process Automation Manager Open Edition

Each chart is designed for a specific product and deployment type, with ILMT compliance values embedded directly into the chart configuration.

Components Included in Each Chart

• Development Environment Charts
  • Canvas – Development interface
  • CORS Proxy – Secure cross-origin access
  • Extended Services – Supports DMN Runner
  • Maven Repository – Manages build artifacts

• Runtime Environment Charts
  • Management Console – Runtime monitoring and administration
  • MCP Server – Supports model-context protocol integrations

All components automatically receive the required ILMT annotations during deployment.

How the Automation Works

When you deploy BAMOE using the product-specific Helm charts, ILMT annotations are applied automatically to all components.

Centralized Configuration

ILMT compliance values are defined once at the parent chart level using global.chargedProductValues. Each chart includes preconfigured values:

• productID – Unique identifier for the specific product
• productName – Full product name (for example, IBM Decision Manager Open Edition for DMOE or IBM Process Automation Manager Open Edition for PAMOE)
• productMetric – VIRTUAL_PROCESSOR_CORE

Automatic propagation
These values are propagated to all subcharts through Helm templates. Required ILMT annotations are merged with any user-defined custom annotations.

Consistent compliance
Because the annotations are built into the charts and aligned with your licensed product, deployments are ILMT-compliant by default.

What This Means for You

This enhancement delivers immediate benefits for your operations:

• Faster Deployments: No more manual post-deployment configuration. Typical deployments complete within 3–5 minutes.
• Reduced Risk: Automated annotations eliminate common configuration mistakes that could impact license tracking.
• Simplified Operations: Your teams no longer need to maintain separate ILMT annotation procedures or validation steps.
• Consistent Compliance: ILMT compliance is applied uniformly across development, staging, and production environments, making audits straightforward.

How It Works Behind the Scenes

During deployment, the Helm charts automatically:

1. Read global ILMT values from the parent chart
2. Apply the required annotations to all pods
3. Merge required annotations with any custom metadata

This process is transparent and requires no additional action from you.

Flexibility for Your Custom Needs

Need to add custom annotations for monitoring, logging, or other integrations? No problem. Your custom pod annotations are fully supported and will be merged automatically with the required ILMT compliance metadata.

Getting Started

New Installations

Select the Helm chart corresponding to your preferred licensed product and deployment type, then follow the installation instructions in the official documentation:

• Development Environment Installation: Install using Dev Environment Helm Chart
• Runtime Environment Installation: Install using Runtime Environment Helm Chart

Deployments typically complete within 3–5 minutes, with ILMT tracking enabled by default.

Upgrading from Earlier Versions

Upgrading from BAMOE 9.3.x or earlier is straightforward:

1. Identify your licensed BAMOE product (DMOE or PAMOE)
2. Uninstall the generic charts
3. Install the appropriate product-specific chart
4. Verify ILMT annotations after deployment

For detailed upgrade instructions, refer to the official upgrade guide. For installation and uninstallation procedures, see the New Installations section.

Verification

To confirm that ILMT annotations are applied:

• Kubernetes: kubectl get pods -n <namespace> -o yaml | grep -A 3 "productID"
• OpenShift: oc get pods -n <namespace> -o yaml | grep -A 3 "productID"

Platform Support

The product-specific Helm charts support:

• OpenShift
• Kubernetes
• Minikube

Platform-specific values files are included to simplify deployment across environments.

Conclusion

Automatic ILMT annotation support in BAMOE 9.4.0 reduces deployment effort and improves consistency in license compliance. By embedding compliance metadata directly into product-specific Helm charts, BAMOE deployments are easier to manage and operate at scale.

This enhancement reflects an ongoing effort to improve deployment reliability for enterprise environments.