Delayed boot of a virtual machine in a virtualized computing environment based on a fabric limit

• US 10,002,015 B2
• Filed: 07/10/2015
• Issued: 06/19/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 07/10/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Matzek, Samuel D., Tenner, Jeffrey W., McBrearty, Gerald F.
• Primary Examiner(s): Peugh, Brian
• Application Number:
  US14/796,640
• Publication Number:
  US 20170010897A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,075 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 12/023 Free address space management
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/45562 Creating, deleting, cloning virtual machine instances
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/4557 Distribution of virtual machine instances; Migration and load balancing
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/45575 Starting, stopping, suspending or resuming virtual machine instances
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/45583 Memory management, e.g. access or allocation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0619 in relation to data integrity, e.g. data losses, bit errors
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0631 by allocating resources to storage systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0632 by initialisation or re-initialisation of storage systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/065 Replication mechanisms
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0665 at area level, e.g. provisioning of virtual or logical volumes
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/067 Distributed or networked storage systems, e.g. storage area networks [SAN], network attached storage [NAS]
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/4401 Bootstrapping security arrangements therefor G06F21/57
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45533 Hypervisors; Virtual machine monitors
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45558 Hypervisor-specific management and integration aspects

Abstract

The invention addresses these and other problems associated with the prior art by providing an apparatus and program product that manage virtual machines in a virtualized computing environment based at least in part on limitations associated with storage fabrics through which virtual machines may access one or more storage systems in such an environment. The storage fabric limitations, referred to herein as fabric limits, may be used, for example, in connection with placing virtual machines on hosts in a virtualized computing environment. As another example, fabric limits may be used in connection with deploying virtual machines into a virtualized computing environment to reduce the likelihood of boot errors. As still another example, fabric limits may be used in connection with load balancing across multiple fabrics in a virtualized computing environment.

Claims

1. An apparatus, comprising:

at least one processor; and

program code configured upon execution by the at least one processor to deploy a virtual machine on a host in a computing environment of the type including a fabric coupling the host to a storage system, the program code configured to, in response to initiation of a deployment of the virtual machine;

create the virtual machine on the host;

determine, for a storage volume allocated for the virtual machine on the storage system, an allocation of a limited fabric resource of the fabric;

determine, based upon the determined allocation, whether the fabric has capacity to boot the virtual machine;

in response to determining that the fabric has sufficient capacity to boot the virtual machine and after creating the virtual machine on the host, initiate a boot of the virtual machine on the host; and

in response to determining that the fabric does not have sufficient capacity to boot the virtual machine and after creating the virtual machine on the host, delay the boot of the virtual machine on the host.

2. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the program code is configured to determine whether the fabric has capacity to boot the virtual machine by determining a fabric limit for the limited fabric resource, wherein the limited fabric resource comprises a fabric login for a storage switch in the fabric, and wherein the fabric limit comprises an active login limit of the storage switch.

3. The apparatus of claim 2, wherein the program code is configured to determine the fabric limit by querying the storage switch to retrieve the fabric limit.

4. The apparatus of claim 2, wherein the program code is configured to determine the allocation of the limited fabric resource by tracking active fabric logins in the computing environment.

5. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the program code is configured to delay the boot of the virtual machine on the host by queuing the virtual machine, and wherein the program code is further configured to:

after queuing the virtual machine, determine, for a storage volume allocated for the virtual machine on the storage system, whether the fabric has capacity to boot the queued virtual machine; and

in response to determining that the fabric has capacity to boot the queued virtual machine, dequeue the queued virtual machine and initiate the boot of the queued virtual machine on the host.

6. The apparatus of claim 5, wherein the program code is configured to determine whether the fabric has capacity to boot the queued virtual machine, dequeue the queued virtual machine and initiate the boot of the queued virtual machine on the host using a monitor process.

7. The apparatus of claim 5, wherein the queued virtual machine is among a plurality of queued virtual machines, and wherein the program code is further configured to prioritize an order of the plurality of queued virtual machines to be booted once the fabric has capacity to boot at least one of the plurality of queued virtual machines.

8. The apparatus of claim 5, wherein the storage volume comprises a boot volume, wherein the virtual machine further includes a data volume allocated thereto, and wherein the program code is configured to determine whether the fabric has capacity to boot the virtual machine further by determining whether the fabric has capacity to connect the virtual machine to the data volume.

9. The apparatus of claim 8, wherein the program code is configured to determine whether the fabric has capacity to boot the virtual machine further by determining from a configuration setting whether boot of the virtual machine is permitted when the fabric does not have capacity to connect the virtual machine to the data volume.

10. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the fabric includes a Fibre Channel switch, and wherein the fabric limit is an active Fabric Login (FLOGI) limit, an active Fabric Discovery (FDISC) limit, a zone limit, or a host limit.

11. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the host is among a plurality of a plurality of hosts in the computing environment, and wherein the program code is configured to determine whether the fabric has capacity to boot the virtual machine in response to an instruction to boot the virtual machine, and wherein the program code is further configured to, prior to the instruction to boot the virtual machine:

place the virtual machine on the host prior to creating the virtual machine; and

copy an image for the virtual machine to the storage volume.

12. A program product, comprising:

a non-transitory computer readable medium; and

program code stored on the non-transitory computer readable medium and configured upon execution by at least one processor to deploy a virtual machine on a host in a computing environment of the type including a fabric coupling the host to a storage system, the program code configured to deploy the virtual machine by, in response to initiation of a deployment of the virtual machine, creating the virtual machine on the host, determining, for a storage volume allocated for the virtual machine on the storage system, an allocation of a limited fabric resource of the fabric, determining, based upon the determined allocation, whether the fabric has capacity to boot the virtual machine, in response to determining that the fabric has sufficient capacity to boot the virtual machine and after creating the virtual machine on the host, initiating a boot of the virtual machine on the host, and in response to determining that the fabric does not have sufficient capacity to boot the virtual machine and after creating the virtual machine on the host, delaying the boot of the virtual machine on the host.

13. The apparatus of claim 12, wherein the program code is configured to determine whether the fabric has capacity to boot the virtual machine by determining a fabric limit for the limited fabric resource, wherein the limited fabric resource comprises a fabric login for a storage switch in the fabric, and wherein the fabric limit comprises an active login limit of the storage switch.

14. The program product of claim 13, wherein the program code is configured to determine the allocation of the limited fabric resource by tracking active fabric logins in the computing environment.

15. The program product of claim 12, wherein the program code is configured to delay the boot of the virtual machine on the host by queuing the virtual machine, and wherein the program code is further configured to:

after queuing the virtual machine, determine, for a storage volume allocated for the virtual machine on the storage system, whether the fabric has capacity to boot the queued virtual machine; and

in response to determining that the fabric has capacity to boot the queued virtual machine, dequeue the queued virtual machine and initiate the boot of the queued virtual machine on the host.

16. The program product of claim 15, wherein the queued virtual machine is among a plurality of queued virtual machines, and wherein the program code is further configured to prioritize an order of the plurality of queued virtual machines to be booted once the fabric has capacity to boot at least one of the plurality of queued virtual machines.

17. The program product of claim 15, wherein the storage volume comprises a boot volume, wherein the virtual machine further includes a data volume allocated thereto, and wherein the program code is configured to determine whether the fabric has capacity to boot the virtual machine further by determining whether the fabric has capacity to connect the virtual machine to the data volume.

18. The program product of claim 17, wherein the program code is configured to determine whether the fabric has capacity to boot the virtual machine further by determining from a configuration setting whether boot of the virtual machine is permitted when the fabric does not have capacity to connect the virtual machine to the data volume.

19. The program product of claim 15, wherein the program code is configured to determine whether the fabric has capacity to boot the queued virtual machine, dequeue the queued virtual machine and initiate the boot of the queued virtual machine on the host using a monitor process.

20. The program product of claim 12, wherein the host is among a plurality of a plurality of hosts in the computing environment, and wherein the program code is configured to determine whether the fabric has capacity to boot the virtual machine in response to an instruction to boot the virtual machine, and wherein the program code is further configured to, prior to the instruction to boot the virtual machine:

place the virtual machine on the host prior to creating the virtual machine; and

copy an image for the virtual machine to the storage volume.