Method and apparatus for accessing physical memory belonging to virtual machines from a user level monitor
First Claim
1. A method to enable a user level monitor to access memory that belongs to a guest virtual machine, the method comprising:
- associating a pseudo-device driver with a portion of a virtual address space of a user level monitor (ULM);
detecting, at the ULM, an operation that involves a physical address space of a guest virtual machine (VM); and
in response to detecting the operation, using the portion of the virtual address space of the ULM associated with the pseudo-device driver to access the physical address space of the guest VM.
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Abstract
A processing system may include a service operating system (OS) and a guest virtual machine (VM). The service OS may be a host OS or an OS in a service VM, for instance. The guest VM may have a physical address space. In one embodiment, a pseudo-device driver in the service OS causes an address within the physical address space of the guest VM to be mapped to an address within a virtual address space of a user level monitor (ULM) running on top of the service OS. When an operation that involves the physical address space of the guest VM (e.g., a direct memory access (DMA) operation requested by the guest VM, an interrupt triggered by the guest VM, etc.) is detected, the ULM may use its virtual address space to access the physical address space of the guest VM. Other embodiments are described and claimed.
81 Citations
27 Claims
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1. A method to enable a user level monitor to access memory that belongs to a guest virtual machine, the method comprising:
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associating a pseudo-device driver with a portion of a virtual address space of a user level monitor (ULM); detecting, at the ULM, an operation that involves a physical address space of a guest virtual machine (VM); and in response to detecting the operation, using the portion of the virtual address space of the ULM associated with the pseudo-device driver to access the physical address space of the guest VM. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6)
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7. A method to enable a user level monitor to access memory that belongs to a guest virtual machine, the method comprising:
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detecting, at a user level monitor (ULM), an operation that involves a physical address space of a guest virtual machine (VM); and in response to detecting the operation, using a virtual address space of the ULM to access the physical address space of the guest VM. - View Dependent Claims (8, 9, 10, 11)
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12. An apparatus, comprising:
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a pseudo-device driver to execute in a service operating system (OS); and a user level monitor (ULM) to execute on top of the service OS, the ULM to use the pseudo-device driver to map an address in a physical address space of a guest VM to an address in a virtual address space of the ULM. - View Dependent Claims (13, 14, 15, 16, 17)
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18. A manufacture, comprising:
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a machine-accessible medium; and instructions in the machine-accessible medium, wherein the instructions, when executed in a processing system, cause the processing system to perform operations comprising; detecting, at a user level monitor (ULM), an operation that involves a physical address space of a guest virtual machine (VM); and in response to detecting the operation, using a virtual address space of the ULM to access the physical address space of the guest VM. - View Dependent Claims (19, 20, 21, 22)
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23. A processing system, comprising:
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a guest virtual machine (VM) having a physical address space; a service operating system (OS); a user level monitor (ULM) running on top of the service OS, the ULM having a virtual address space; and a pseudo-device driver in the service OS, the pseudo-device driver to enable the ULM to use the virtual address space of the ULM to access an address within the physical address space of the guest VM. - View Dependent Claims (24, 25, 26, 27)
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Specification