VIRTUAL MACHINE PROVISIONING USING REPLICATED CONTAINERS

• US 20140109087A1
• Filed: 10/17/2012
• Published: 04/17/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 10/17/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Varava, Natalia, Jujare, Madhusudhan R., Linares, Hector, Saputra, Erwien E.
• Granted Patent: US 9,229,759 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 718/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/4557 Distribution of virtual machine instances; Migration and load balancing
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45558 Hypervisor-specific management and integration aspects

Abstract

A virtual machine manager that provisions of virtual machines on hosts that share a tenant store. Virtual machines can be provisioned using an arraying subsystem of the tenant store without having to actually physically copy all of the operating system files for each virtual machine. Instead, the arraying subsystem virtually copies the operating system files by generating virtual operating system containers that point to a master operating system container that actually contains operating system content in the tenant store. To increase the limit on the number of virtual operating system containers that can be virtually copied from a master operating system container, the master operating system container may itself by physically, rather than virtually copied. Then, virtual operating system containers may be virtually copied from any of the master operating system containers that contain the same operating system content.

Claims

1. A computer program product comprising one or more computer-readable storage media having thereon computer-executable instructions that are structured such that, when executed by one or more processors of a computing system, cause the computing system to perform a method for supporting provisioning of virtual machines from a master operating system container, the method comprising:

an act of identifying a tenant store as storing a master operating system container, an origin master operating system container;

an act of determining a maximum number of virtual operating system containers that an arraying subsystem of the tenant store can generate by virtual copying from the origin master operating system container;

an act of determining a number of virtual machines that will operate from the tenant store that have been or are to be provisioned from an operating system content of the origin master operating system container;

an act of determining that a number of physical master operating system containers are sufficient to support the number of virtual machines given the maximum number of virtual operating system containers that can be generated from virtual copying the origin master operating system container; and

an act of causing the tenant store to physically replicate the master operating system container such that there is the number of physical master operating system containers in the tenant store, each of the physical master operating system containers being associated with each other and containing the operating system content, being either the origin master operating system container, or being physically copied from the origin master operating system container.

2. The computer program product in accordance with claim 1, wherein the number of virtual machines is greater than the maximum number of virtual operating system containers that an arraying subsystem of the tenant store can generate by virtual copying from the origin master operating system container.

3. The computer program product in accordance with claim 1, wherein the tenant store is a storage area network.

4. The computer program product in accordance with claim 1, wherein the computing system is a tenant-based computing system.

5. The computer program product in accordance with claim 1, wherein the computing system is within a public cloud computing environment.

6. The computer program product in accordance with claim 1, the method further comprising causing the arraying subsystem to generate a virtual operating system container based on the operating system content for each of the number of virtual machines that will operate from the tenant store that at least are to be provisioned from the operating system content.

7. The computer program product in accordance with claim 1, wherein the act of determining that a number of virtual machines will operate comprises:

an act of receiving a request to provision the number of virtual machines, wherein the number of virtual machines are to be provisioned from the operating system content.

8. The computer program product in accordance with claim 1, wherein the act of determining that a number of virtual machines will operate comprises:

an act of receiving a request to provision a number of virtual machines from the operating system content, wherein the requested number of virtual machines that are to be provisioned from the operating system content in combination with a number of virtual machines that have already been provisioned from the operating system content equals the number of virtual machines that have been or are to be provisioned from an operating system content of the origin master operating system container.

9. A system comprising:

a virtual machine manager;

a set of one or more host computing systems that are each capable of hosting a plurality of virtual machines; and

a tenant store being shared by each of the set of one or more host computing systems, wherein the tenant store stores an origin master operating system container having operating system content, and an arraying subsystem configured to virtually copy and expose a maximum number of virtual operation system containers by virtual copying from the origin master operating system container,

the virtual machine manager configured to perform the following in response to a request to provision a number of virtual machines based on the operating system content;

based on the request, an act of determining a number of virtual machines that will operate from the tenant store that have been or are to be provisioned from an operating system content of the origin master operating system container;

an act of determining that a number of physical master operating system containers are sufficient to support the determined number of virtual machines given the maximum number of virtual operating system containers that can be generated from virtual copying the origin master operating system container; and

an act of causing the tenant store to physically replicate the master operating system container such that there is the number of physical master operating system containers in the tenant store, each of the physical master operating system containers being associated with each other and containing the operating system content, being either the origin master operating system container, or being physically copied from the origin master operating system container.

10. The system in accordance with claim 9, wherein the tenant store, the set of one or more host computing systems, and the virtual machine manager are located within a single tenant environment.

11. A method for supporting provisioning of virtual machines from a master operating system container, the method comprising:

an act of identifying a tenant store as storing a master operating system container, an origin master operating system container;

an act of determining a maximum number of virtual operating system containers that an arraying subsystem of the tenant store can generate by virtual copying from the origin master operating system container;

an act of determining a number of virtual machines that will operate from the tenant store that have been or are to be provisioned from an operating system content of the origin master operating system container;

an act of determining that a number of physical master operating system containers are sufficient to support the number of virtual machines given the maximum number of virtual operating system containers that can be generated from virtual copying the origin master operating system container; and

an act of causing the tenant store to physically replicate the master operating system container such that there is the number of physical master operating system containers in the tenant store, each of the physical master operating system containers being associated with each other and containing the operating system content, being either the origin master operating system container, or being physically copied from the origin master operating system container.

12. The method in accordance with claim 11, wherein the number of virtual machines is greater than the maximum number of virtual operating system containers that an arraying subsystem of the tenant store can generate by virtual copying from the origin master operating system container.

13. The method in accordance with claim 11, wherein the tenant store is a storage area network.

14. The method in accordance with claim 11, wherein the computing system is a tenant-based computing system.

15. The method in accordance with claim 11, wherein the computing system is within a public cloud computing environment.

16. The method in accordance with claim 11, further comprising causing the arraying subsystem to generate a virtual operating system container based on the operating system content for each of the number of virtual machines that will operate from the tenant store that at least are to be provisioned from the operating system content.

17. The method in accordance with claim 11, wherein the act of determining that a number of virtual machines will operate comprises:

an act of receiving a request to provision the number of virtual machines, wherein the number of virtual machines are to be provisioned from the operating system content.

18. The method in accordance with claim 11, wherein the act of determining that a number of virtual machines will operate comprises:

an act of receiving a request to provision a number of virtual machines from the operating system content, wherein the requested number of virtual machines that are to be provisioned from the operating system content in combination with a number of virtual machines that have already been provisioned from the operating system content equals the number of virtual machines that have been or are to be provisioned from an operating system content of the origin master operating system container.

19. The method in accordance with claim 11, wherein the determined number of virtual machines that will operate from the tenant store is greater than 64.

20. The method in accordance with claim 11, wherein the determined number of virtual machines that will operate from the tenant store is greater than 256.