METHOD AND APPARATUS OF DYNAMICALLY ALLOCATING RESOURCES ACROSS MULTIPLE VIRTUAL MACHINES

• US 20090198766A1
• Filed: 01/30/2009
• Published: 08/06/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 01/31/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Chen, Ying, Xiang, Zhe, Yang, Bo, Wang, Qing Bo
• Granted Patent: US 8,438,283 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/202
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/45591 Monitoring or debugging support
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45558 Hypervisor-specific management and integration aspects

Abstract

An apparatus and method for dynamically allocating resources across multiple virtual machines. The method monitors the activities of the applications in each virtual machine running on a hosting server, determines the activities of the applications in each virtual machine based on the activities of the monitored applications, prioritizes each virtual machine based on the determined priorities of the applications in each virtual machine, and dynamically adjusts the resource allocation of each virtual machine on the hosting server based on the priority of each virtual machine. The resources of the hosting server can be dynamically allocated to each virtual machine according to the real-time resource requirement of the active applications, and the applications of different virtual machines can negotiate the resource allocation on the hosting server.

Claims

1. A method for dynamically allocating resources across multiple virtual machines, the method comprising the steps of:

monitoring activities of applications in each virtual machine running on a hosting server;

determining priorities of the applications in each virtual machine, based on the monitored activities of the applications;

prioritizing each virtual machine based on the determined priorities of the applications in each virtual machine;

dynamically adjusting resources allocated to each virtual machine by the hosting server, based on the priority of each virtual machine.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein said step of monitoring is carried out by a virtual machine activity monitor.

3. The method according to claim 2, wherein the virtual machine activity monitor is a task manager of operating system.

4. The method according to claim 3, wherein, said prioritizing step further comprises the steps of:

if the active status of the applications in the virtual machine have changed, notifying said change to a virtual machine priority module in the hosting server via the task manager; and

re-determining the priority of each virtual machine by (i) having the virtual machine priority module look up an application weight table to determine the priority of each application; and

(ii) calculating the weight of each virtual machine.

5. The method according to claim 4, wherein said dynamically adjusting step further comprises:

transmitting the re-determined priority of each virtual machine to a resource arbiter in the hosting server using the virtual machine priority module; and

re-assigning priority of each virtual machine by invoking a function; and

thereafter dynamically allocating resources to each virtual machine using the resource arbiter.

6. The method according to claim 4, wherein the called function is function SetPriorityClass( ), and parameter of the called function is set to one of the parameters:

HIGH_PRIORITY_CLASS, IDLE_PRIORITY_CLASS, NORMAL_PRIORITY_CLASS and REALTIME_PRIORITY_CLASS, to re-assign priorities of the virtual machines.

7. The method according to claim 4, wherein the application weight table is included in application priority module in the hosting server and the virtual machine priority module includes a virtual machine real-time weight table.

8. The method according to claim 2, wherein, in said monitoring step, the virtual machine activity monitor is a network activity monitor for monitoring sockets.

9. The method according to claim 8, wherein said prioritizing step further comprises the steps of:

notifying the virtual machine priority module which sockets are being used in the applications that have an active status on the virtual machines in the hosting server if the active status of the applications in the virtual machines have changed; and

re-determining the priorities of the virtual machines by (i) mapping the sockets of the virtual machines into the sockets of the hosting server to obtain sockets of the hosting server that are occupied by each active application and (ii) looking up the application weight table to determine the priority of each active application.

10. The method according to claim 9, wherein said dynamically adjusting step further comprises:

transmitting the re-determined priority of each virtual machine to a resource arbiter in the hosting server using the virtual machine priority module; and

adjusting allocation of network bandwidth resources in real time by the resource arbiter according to the priorities of the sockets recorded in the virtual machine real-time weight table.

11. The method according to claim 10, the step of adjusting allocation of network bandwidth resources in real time further comprises the steps of:

intercepting an IP packet in the IP layer;

identifying which hosting server socket said IP packet belongs to by using the IP packet'"'"'s address/port/type of network protocol; and

if the bandwidth consumed by said hosting server socket does not exceed a predetermined bandwidth, passing said IP packet, otherwise, letting said IP packet wait in a queue.

12. The method according to claim 11, wherein the application weight table is included in the application priority module of the hosting server, and the virtual machine real time weight table is included in the virtual machine priority module.

13. The method according to claim 7, wherein a backup application having lowest priority, a Web server application having a higher priority, and a real-time multimedia application having highest priority in the application weight table.

14. An apparatus for dynamically allocating resources across multiple virtual machines, the apparatus comprising:

a virtual machine activity monitor in a virtual machine for monitoring activities of applications in each virtual machine running on a hosting server;

an application priority module for determining priorities of the applications in each virtual machine, based on the monitored activities of the applications;

a virtual machine priority module in the hosting server for prioritizing each virtual machine, based on the determined priorities of the applications in each virtual machine; and

a resource arbiter in the hosting server for dynamically adjusting resource allocated to each virtual machine, according to the priority of each virtual machine.

15. The apparatus according to claim 14, wherein the virtual machine activity monitor in the virtual machine is a task manager of operating system.

16. The apparatus according to claim 15, further comprising:

means for notifying said change to a virtual machine priority module in the hosting server via the task manager if the active status of the applications in the virtual machine have changed; and

means for re-determining the priority of each virtual machine by having the virtual machine priority module look up an application weight table to determine the priority of each application and calculating the weight of each virtual machine.

17. The apparatus according to claim 16, wherein:

the virtual machine priority module transmits the re-determined priority of each virtual machine to the resource arbiter; and

the resource arbiter re-assigns priorities of different virtual machines by invoking a function, and then dynamically allocating resources to each virtual machine.

18. The apparatus according to claim 17, wherein the called function is SetPriorityClass( ), and the parameter of the called function is set to one of the parameters:

HIGH_PRIORITY_CLASS, IDLE_PRIORITY_CLASS, NORMAL_PRIORITY_CLASS and REALTIME_PRIORITY_CLASS, to re-assign the priorities of the virtual machines.

19. The apparatus according to claim 16, wherein the application weight table is included in the application priority module of the hosting server, and the virtual machine real time weight table is included in the virtual machine priority module.

20. The apparatus according to claim 14, wherein the virtual machine activity monitor is a network activity monitor.

21. The apparatus according to claim 14, wherein:

if the active status of the applications in the virtual machines have changed, the network activity monitor notifies the virtual machine priority module in the hosting server of the sockets used by the applications having an active status in the virtual machines; and

re-determining the priorities of the virtual machines by (i) mapping the sockets of the virtual machines that are occupied by each active application to the sockets of the hosting server, (ii) looking up the application weight table to determine which active applications have priority to the hosting server'"'"'s different sockets and (iii) recording the priorities into the virtual machine priority module.

22. The apparatus according to claim 21, wherein the virtual machine priority module transmits the re-determined priority of each virtual machine to the resource arbiter;

and wherein the resource arbiter dynamically adjusts, in real time, the allocation of I/O network bandwidth resources according to the priorities recorded in the virtual machine priority module.

23. The apparatus according to claim 22, further comprising:

a resource arbiter which (i) intercepts an IP packet in the IP layer;

(ii) identifies which hosting server socket said IP packet belongs to by using the IP packet'"'"'s address/port/type of network protocol; and

(iii) if the bandwidth consumed by said hosting server socket does not exceed a predetermined bandwidth, passes said IP packet, otherwise, lets said IP packet wait in a queue.

24. The apparatus according to claim 21, wherein the application weight table is included in the application priority module of the hosting server and the virtual machine real time weight table is included in the virtual machine priority module.

25. The apparatus according to claim 19, wherein a real-time multimedia application has the highest priority, a Web server application has a higher priority, and a backup application has the lowest priority in the application weight table.

26. A computer readable article of manufacture tangibly embodying computer readable instructions for causing a data processing system to execute a computer implemented method for dynamically allocating resources across multiple virtual machines, the method comprising the steps of:

monitoring activities of applications in each virtual machine running on a hosting server;

determining priorities of the applications in each virtual machine, based on the monitored activities of the applications;

prioritizing each virtual machine, based on the determined priorities of the applications in each virtual machine; and

dynamically adjusting resources allocated to each virtual machine by the hosting server, based on the priority of each virtual machine.