Measuring virtual infrastructure performance as a function of physical infrastructure performance

• US 10,079,745 B2
• Filed: 08/01/2016
• Issued: 09/18/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 11/13/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Kyndryl Incorporated
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Amulothu, Venkata Siva N., Gadde, Kavita, Kapur, Ashish, Shukla, Vishal, Yeddula, Saritha
• Primary Examiner(s): Jain, Raj K
• Application Number:
  US15/225,222
• Publication Number:
  US 20170141990A1
• Time in Patent Office: 778 Days
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/4641 Virtual LANs, VLANs, e.g. virtual private networks [VPN] LAN interconnection over a bridge based backbone H04L12/462; encapsulation techniques H04L12/4633; routing of packets H04L45/00; packet switches H04L49/00; virtual private networks for security H04L63/0272
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0806 for initial configuration or provisioning, e.g. plug-and-play
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/083 for increasing network speed
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0896 Bandwidth or capacity management, i.e. automatically increasing or decreasing capacities flow or congestion control using dynamic resource allocation, e.g. in-call renegotiation, H04L47/76
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/04 Processing captured monitoring data, e.g. for logfile generation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0882 Utilisation of link capacity
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0888 Throughput
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0894 Packet rate
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/16 Threshold monitoring
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/20 the monitoring system or the monitored elements being virtualised, abstracted or software-defined entities, e.g. SDN or NFV
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/50 Testing arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/64 using an overlay routing layer
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/10 in which an application is distributed across nodes in the network software deployment G06F8/60; multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/34 involving the movement of software or configuration parameters network booting or remote initial program loading [RIPL] G06F9/4416

Abstract

A method and associated systems for using a software-defined network (SDN) controller to automatically test cloud performance. A bandwidth measuring and optimizing system associated with the SDN controller detects a triggering condition and, in response, directs a network-management tool to measure a bandwidth of a segment of a physical infrastructure of a network and directs the SDN controller to provision a virtual machine that then measures a bandwidth of a corresponding segment of virtual infrastructure that is overlaid upon the physical segment. In some embodiments, these two tests are synchronized so as to concurrently measure physical and virtual bandwidths while the same test data passes through the virtual infrastructure segment. The measured bandwidth of the virtual segment is then compared to the measured bandwidth of the physical segment in order to determine an efficiency of the virtual network.

Claims

1. A bandwidth measuring and optimizing system comprising a processor, a memory coupled to the processor, and a computer-readable hardware storage device coupled to the processor, the storage device containing program code configured to be run by the processor via the memory to implement a method for using an SDN controller to automatically test cloud performance, the method comprising:

the system running a first bandwidth test on a physical path that connects two physical nodes of a physical network, wherein the first bandwidth test measures a first network bandwidth available through the physical network along the physical path;

the system provisioning a virtual machine in a virtualized computing platform running on the physical network;

the system instructing the virtual machine to run a second bandwidth test on a software-defined path that connects two virtual nodes of a software-defined network provisioned on the virtualized computing environment, wherein the second bandwidth test measures a second network bandwidth available through the software-defined network along the software-defined path;

the system detecting a trigger condition, wherein the trigger condition is selected from a group comprising;

a detection that a virtual network bandwidth falls above or below a threshold value, a detection that a physical network bandwidth falls above or below a threshold value, a receipt of a test request from an extrinsic hardware or software module, an occurrence of a particular time, a determination that a certain duration of time has elapsed since the most recent performance of the first and second bandwidth tests, and a receipt of a test request from a user; and

the system performing the running, provisioning, and initiating in response to the detecting.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the software-defined path is a component of a virtual network that is overlaid on top of the physical infrastructure of the physical path.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the second network bandwidth identifies bandwidth available over virtual infrastructure provisioned on physical infrastructure through which is available the first network bandwidth.

4. The system of claim 1, further comprising:

the processor determining a network-path efficiency between the two physical nodes by comparing the first network bandwidth to the second network bandwidth.

5. The system of claim 4, wherein the network-path efficiency is determined by dividing the second network bandwidth by the first network bandwidth.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the first bandwidth test and the second bandwidth test are performed closely enough in time to produce measurements that may be considered concurrent.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the system uses a synchronization mechanism to initiate the first bandwidth test at a same time that the virtual machine initiates the second bandwidth test.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the first bandwidth test measures a throughput of network traffic passing through the physical path while the virtual machine is performing the second bandwidth test.

9. A method for using an SDN controller to automatically test cloud performance, the method for using an SDN controller to automatically test cloud performance, the method comprising:

running a first bandwidth test on a physical path that connects two physical nodes of a physical network, wherein the first bandwidth test measures a first network bandwidth available through the physical network along the physical path;

provisioning a virtual machine in a virtualized computing platform running on the physical network;

instructing the virtual machine to run a second bandwidth test on a software-defined path that connects two virtual nodes of a software-defined network provisioned on the virtualized computing environment, wherein the second bandwidth test measures a second network bandwidth available through the software-defined network along the software-defined path;

detecting a trigger condition, wherein the trigger condition is selected from a group comprising;

a detection that a virtual network bandwidth falls above or below a threshold value, a detection that a physical network bandwidth falls above or below a threshold value, a receipt of a test request from an extrinsic hardware or software module, an occurrence of a particular time, a determination that a certain duration of time has elapsed since the most recent performance of the first and second bandwidth tests, and a receipt of a test request from a user; and

performing the running, provisioning, and initiating in response to the detecting.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the software-defined path is a component of a virtual network that is overlaid on top of the physical infrastructure of the physical path.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the second network bandwidth identifies bandwidth available over virtual infrastructure provisioned on physical infrastructure through which is available the first network bandwidth.

12. The method of claim 9, wherein the software-defined path is a component of a virtual network that is overlaid on top of the physical infrastructure of the physical path.

13. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

the processor determining a network-path efficiency between the two physical nodes by comparing the first network bandwidth to the second network bandwidth.

14. The method of claim 9, wherein the first bandwidth test and the second bandwidth test are performed closely enough in time such that the first bandwidth test measures a throughput of network traffic passing through the physical path while the virtual machine is performing the second bandwidth test.

15. The method of claim 9, further comprising providing at least one support service for at least one of creating, integrating, hosting, maintaining, and deploying computer-readable program code in the computer system, wherein the computer-readable program code in combination with the computer system is configured to implement the running, the provisioning, the instructing, the detecting, and the informing.

16. A computer program product, comprising a computer-readable hardware storage device having a computer-readable program code stored therein, the program code configured to be executed by a bandwidth measuring and optimizing system comprising a processor, a memory coupled to the processor, and a computer-readable hardware storage device coupled to the processor, the storage device containing program code configured to be run by the processor via the memory to implement a method for using an SDN controller to automatically test cloud performance, the method for using an SDN controller to automatically test cloud performance, the method comprising:

the system running a first bandwidth test on a physical path that connects two physical nodes of a physical network, wherein the first bandwidth test measures a first network bandwidth available through the physical network along the physical path;

the system provisioning a virtual machine in a virtualized computing platform running on the physical network;

the system instructing the virtual machine to run a second bandwidth test on a software-defined path that connects two virtual nodes of a software-defined network provisioned on the virtualized computing environment, wherein the second bandwidth test measures a second network bandwidth available through the software-defined network along the software-defined path;

the system detecting a trigger condition, wherein the trigger condition is selected from a group comprising;

a detection that a virtual network bandwidth falls above or below a threshold value, a detection that a physical network bandwidth falls above or below a threshold value, a receipt of a test request from an extrinsic hardware or software module, an occurrence of a particular time, a determination that a certain duration of time has elapsed since the most recent performance of the first and second bandwidth tests, and a receipt of a test request from a user; and

the system performing the running, provisioning, and initiating in response to the detecting.

17. The computer program product of claim 16,

wherein the software-defined path is a component of a virtual network that is overlaid on top of the physical infrastructure of the physical path, and

wherein the second network bandwidth identifies bandwidth available over virtual infrastructure provisioned on physical infrastructure through which is available the first network bandwidth.

18. The computer program product of claim 16, wherein the software-defined path is a component of a virtual network that is overlaid on top of the physical infrastructure of the physical path.

19. The computer program product of claim 16, further comprising:

the processor determining a network-path efficiency between the two physical nodes by comparing the first network bandwidth to the second network bandwidth.

20. The computer program product of claim 16, wherein the first bandwidth test and the second bandwidth test are performed closely enough in time such that the first bandwidth test measures a throughput of network traffic passing through the physical path while the virtual machine is performing the second bandwidth test.