Managing multiple virtual machines

• US 20040044643A1
• Filed: 04/10/2003
• Published: 03/04/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 04/11/2002
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Levanta, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Levanta, Inc.
• Inventors: OʼNeill, David M., deVries, David A., Olbert, Arthur G., Neufeld, Christopher
• Application Number:
  US10/413,440
• Publication Number:
  US 20040044643A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 707/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/45562 Creating, deleting, cloning virtual machine instances
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45558 Hypervisor-specific management and integration aspects

Abstract

A mainframe computer executes multiple instances of virtual machines. An administrator uses a set of manager instances to create and manage a set of managed instances. The manager instances include a configuration manager that creates managed instances according to templates. A template describes aspects of a managed instance, including the resources and software available to it. The manager instances also include a file server that maps file access requests from managed instances to files in a storage device. The administrator installs software in the storage device and uses the templates and other data to create mappings in the file server that allow multiple managed instances to independently execute the software. The administrator can easily maintain the managed instances and software executed by the machines.

Claims

1. A system for managing instances of virtual machines on a computer system, the system comprising:

a file server module adapted to receive file access requests from managed instances executing on the computer system and selectively map the file access requests to files stored in a storage device associated with the computer system;

a template describing aspects of a managed instance for execution on the computer system and software available to the instance; and

a configuration manager module adapted to create a managed instance on the computer system having the aspects described by the template and to establish mappings in the file server module making the software described by the template available to the managed instance.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the configuration manager module and the file server module respectively execute in separate virtual machine instances on the computer system.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the template describes aspects and software for a managed instance optimized for a specific purpose.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the template further describes file mappings for the managed instance and wherein the configuration manager module is further adapted to establish the mappings described by the template in the file server module.

5. The system of claim 1, further comprising:

a database holding data utilized by the configuration manager module to create the managed instance on the computer system.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the database comprises:

a templates module holding a plurality of templates describing aspects of a plurality of managed instances, wherein the configuration manager module is adapted to create managed instances having the aspects described by the templates.

7. The system of claim 5, wherein the database comprises:

a packages module holding data describing files forming software packages stored in the storage device associated with the computer system.

8. The system of claim 7, wherein the configuration manager is adapted to use the data in the packages module to establish mappings in the file server module making the software specified by the template available to the managed instance.

9. The system of claim 8, wherein the software is an operating system.

10. The system of claim 5, wherein the database comprises:

an instance groups module holding data describing relationships among sets of managed instances executing on the computer system and sets of users of the managed instances.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein the data in the instance groups module restricts access to particular set of managed instances to only a particular class of users.

12. The system of claim 1, wherein the computer system includes a control program for accessing resources of the computer system, further comprising:

a control program manager module for providing an interface between the configuration manager module and the control program, wherein the configuration manager module accesses the control program -to create the managed instance on the computer system.

13. The system of claim 1, wherein the storage device is a direct access storage device (DASD) and wherein the file server makes the DASD appear to the managed instance as at least one network file system volume.

14. The system of claim 1, wherein the file server module comprises:

a file database holding data managing relationships between the managed instances and the files in the storage device.

15. The system of claim 14, wherein the data managing relationships comprise:

data for selectively mapping file requests from a first managed instance for a identified file to a first file in the storage device and for selectively mapping file requests from a second managed instance for the identified file to a second file in the storage device.

16. The system of claim 1, further comprising:

a version control module adapted to track changes to files utilized by the managed instance.

17. A method for managing virtual machines on a mainframe computer, comprising:

loading software into a storage device associated with the mainframe computer, the software comprising a plurality of files;

establishing one or more managed instance templates, a template describing aspects of a managed instance and software available to the managed instance;

creating a managed instance on the mainframe computer, the managed instance having the aspects described by the template; and

establishing mappings for the managed instance to selected files in the storage device to provide the managed instance with the software described by the template.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein the loading comprises:

loading a plurality of software packages into the storage device; and

storing data representative of the files comprising each software package in a packages module in the storage device, wherein establishing the mappings uses the data representative of the files to provide the managed instance with the software.

19. The method of claim 17, further comprising:

creating a plurality of manager instances on the mainframe computer, the manager instances providing functionality for creating the managed instance and establishing the mappings to selected files for the managed instance.

20. The method of claim 17, further comprising:

editing a managed instance template to create a template describing a managed instance having aspects and available software optimized for performing a specific purpose.

21. The method of claim 17, wherein establishing mappings comprises:

establishing data describing mappings for a plurality of managed instances, the mappings associating files identified by ones of the managed instances with files in the storage device.

22. The method of claim 21, wherein an identified file is mapped to a first file in the storage device for a first managed instance and to a second file in the storage device for a second managed instance.

23. The method of claim 17, further comprising:

establishing rights for classes of users of the managed instance.

24. A computer program product comprising:

a computer-readable medium having computer program logic embodied therein for managing instances of virtual machines on a computer system, the computer program logic comprising;

a file server module adapted to receive file access requests from managed instances of virtual machines executing on the computer system and selectively map the file access requests to files stored in a storage device associated with the computer system;

a template describing aspects of a managed instance for execution on the computer system and software available to the managed instance; and

a configuration manager module adapted to create a managed instance on the computer system having the aspects described by the template and to establish mappings in the file server module making the software described by the template available to the managed instance.

25. The computer program product of claim 24, wherein the configuration manager module and the file server module respectively execute in separate instances of virtual machines on the computer system.

26. The computer program product of claim 24, wherein the template describes aspects and software for a managed instance optimized for a specific purpose.

27. The computer program product of claim 24, wherein the template further describes file mappings for the managed instance and wherein the configuration manager module is further adapted to establish the mappings described by the template in the file server module.

28. The computer program product of claim 24, further comprising:

a database holding data utilized by the configuration manager module to create the managed instance on the computer system.

29. The computer program product of claim 28, wherein the database comprises:

a templates module holding a plurality of templates describing aspects of a plurality of managed instances, wherein the configuration manager module is adapted to create managed instances having the aspects described by the templates.

30. The computer program product of claim 28, wherein the database comprises:

a packages module holding data describing files forming software packages stored in the storage device associated with the computer system.

31. The computer program product of claim 30, wherein the configuration manager is adapted to use the data in the packages module to establish mappings in the file server module making the software specified by the template available to the managed instance.

32. The computer program product of claim 28, wherein the database comprises:

an instance groups module holding data describing relationships among sets of managed instances executing on the computer system and sets of users of the managed instances.

33. The computer program product of claim 32, wherein the data in the instance groups module restrict access to aspects of particular sets of managed instances to only a particular class of users.

34. The computer program product of claim 24, wherein the computer system includes a control program for accessing resources of the computer system, further comprising:

a control program manager module for providing an interface between the configuration manager module and the control program, wherein the configuration manager module accesses the control program to create the managed instance on the computer system.

35. The computer program product of claim 24, wherein the file server module comprises:

a file database holding data managing relationships between the managed instances and the files in the storage device.

36. The computer program product of claim 35, wherein the data managing relationships comprise:

data for selectively mapping file requests from a first managed instance for a identified file to a first file in the storage device and for selectively mapping file requests from a second managed instance for the identified file to a second file in the storage device.

37. The computer program product of claim 24, the computer program logic further comprising:

a version control module adapted to track changes to files utilized by the managed instances.