VIRTUAL MACHINE MOBILITY IN DATA CENTERS

• US 20110314155A1
• Filed: 06/16/2010
• Published: 12/22/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 06/16/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Juniper Networks Incorporated
• Original Assignee: Juniper Networks Incorporated
• Inventors: VENKATRAMANI, Anjan, NARAYANASWAMY, Krishna
• Granted Patent: US 8,775,625 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/226
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/4856 resumption being on a different machine, e.g. task migration, virtual machine migration G06F9/5088 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 10/00 Energy efficient computing, e.g. low power processors, power management or thermal management

Abstract

A data center management device determines that a virtual machine should be moved from a first physical system to a second physical system. The data center management device instructs a first service appliance at the first physical system to perform state synchronization with a second service appliance at the second physical system in order to continue providing the services offered prior to the move. The data center management device instructs the virtual machine to be instantiated at the second physical system.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

determining, at a data center management device, that a virtual machine should be moved from a first physical system to a second physical system;

sending, from the data center management device, a first set of instructions to service appliances at the first and second physical systems to perform state synchronization with one another;

sending, from the data center management device, a second set of instructions to instantiate a copy of the virtual machine in the second physical system; and

shutting down the virtual machine in the first physical system.

2. The method of claim 1, further including:

synchronizing, in response to the first set of instructions and at the service appliances, a state describing operation of the virtual machine.

3. The method of claim 1, where information corresponding to the state synchronization includes policy information related to a session being handled by the virtual machine, a user account name of a user associated with the session, state information associated with the session, or Internet protocol addresses related to the session.

4. The method of claim 1, where the service appliances implement at least one of a firewall service, an Internet Protocol Security (IPSec) service, a Virtual Private Network (VPN) service, a Wide Area Network (WAN) optimization service, a load balancing service, an Intrusion Detection and Prevent (IDP) service, or a Unified Threat Management (UTM) service.

5. The method of claim 1, where the first physical system comprises a first data center and where the second physical system comprises a second data center.

6. The method of claim 1, where the virtual machine handles a session, and where a first service appliance, at the first physical system, of the service appliances, services the session prior to instantiation of the copy of the virtual machine in the second physical system.

7. The method of claim 6, where a second service appliance, at the second physical system, of the service appliances, services the session at the second data center subsequent to instantiation of the copy of the virtual machine in the second physical system.

8. The method of claim 1, where sending the second set of instructions to instantiate a copy of the virtual machine in the second physical system includes sending a memory image of the virtual machine to a hypervisor in the second physical system.

9. A device, comprising:

a memory configured to store instructions;

a processor configured to execute the instructions to;

determine that a virtual machine should be moved from a first physical system to a second physical system,

instruct a first service appliance at the first physical system to perform state synchronization with a second service appliance at the second physical system, where the first and second service appliances implement at least one of a firewall service, an Internet Protocol Security (IPSec) service, a Virtual Private Network (VPN) service, a Wide Area Network (WAN) optimization service, a load balancing service, an Intrusion Detection and Prevention (IDP) service, or a Unified Threat Management (UTM) service; and

cause a copy of the virtual machine at the first physical system to be instantiated at the second physical system.

10. The device of claim 9, where the processor is further configured to execute the instructions to:

shut down the virtual machine in the first physical system.

11. The device of claim 9, where the state includes policy information related to a session being handled by the virtual machine, a user account name of a user associated with the session, state information associated with the session, or Internet protocol addresses related to the session.

12. The device of claim 9, where the first physical system comprises a first data center and where the second physical system comprises a second data center.

13. The device of claim 9, where the virtual machine handles a session, and where the first service appliance services the session prior to movement of the virtual machine from the first physical system to the second physical system.

14. The device of claim 13, where the second service appliance services the session at the second data center subsequent to instantiation of the virtual machine at the second data center.

15. A data center, comprising:

at least one server configured to implement a virtual machine, where the virtual machine handles a session at a first data center; and

a service appliance configured to execute a service related to the session, where the service includes one of a firewall service, an Internet Protocol Security (IPSec) service, a Virtual Private Network (VPN) service, a Wide Area Network (WAN) optimization service, a load balancing service, an Intrusion Detection and Prevention (IDP) service, or a Unified Threat Management (UTM) service,

where the service appliance receives first instructions to perform on-demand state synchronization for the virtual machine with another service appliance in a second data center, and performs the state synchronization with the other service appliance based on the received first instructions, and

where the virtual machine receives second instructions to cause a copy of the virtual machine to be instantiated at a server at the second data center.

16. The data center of claim 15, where the virtual machine and the service appliance receive the first and second instructions from a data center management device that is external to the data center.

17. The data center of claim 15, where the state includes policy information related to the session, a user account name of a user associated with the session, state information associated with the session, or one or more network addresses related to the session.

18. The data center of claim 17, where the one or more network addresses include Internet Protocol (IP) addresses associated with the data center or the other data center.

19. The data center of claim 15, where the server shuts down the virtual machine at the first physical system.

20. The data center of claim 15, where the first instructions cause the first service appliance and the another service appliance to perform the state synchronization with one another.

21. The data center of claim 15, where the first and second instructions are received from a hierarchically arranged data center management device.