SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR MANAGING DATA INPUT/OUTPUT OPERATIONS IN A VIRTUAL COMPUTING ENVIRONMENT

• US 20160062787A1
• Filed: 11/05/2015
• Published: 03/03/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 05/23/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: SanDisk Technologies LLC (Western Digital Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Intelligent Intellectual Property Holdings LLC
• Inventors: Joshi, Vikram, Luan, Yang, Apte, Manish R., Vidwans, Hrishikesh A., Brown, Michael F.
• Granted Patent: US 10,365,938 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 12/084 with a shared cache
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 12/0871 Allocation or management of cache space
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/45579 I/O management, e.g. providing access to device drivers or storage
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/45583 Memory management, e.g. access or allocation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2212/152 Virtualized environment, e.g. logically partitioned system
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2212/601 Reconfiguration of cache memory
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2212/6042 Allocation of cache space to multiple users or processors
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45558 Hypervisor-specific management and integration aspects

Abstract

Systems and methods for managing data input/output operations are described that include virtual machines operating with a shared storage within a host. In such a system, a computer-implemented method is provided for dynamically provisioning cache storage while operating system applications continue to operate, including stalling the virtual machine'"'"'s local cache storage operations, changing the provision of cache storage size; and resuming the operations of the virtual machine.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method of dynamically provisioning cache storage while operating system applications continue to operate, comprising:

stalling the virtual machine'"'"'s local cache storage operations;

changing the provision of cache storage size; and

resuming the operations of the virtual machine.

2. A computer-implemented method according to claim 1, wherein stalling the virtual machine includes stopping the sending of I/O data transfers from the virtual machine to cache storage.

3. A computer-implemented method according to claim 1, wherein stalling the virtual

machine further includes allowing outstanding I/O data transfers between the virtual machine and the cache storage to complete.

4. A computer-implemented method according to claim 1, wherein operating system applications continue to operate while the virtual machine is stalled.

5. A computer-implemented method according to claim 1, wherein I/O data transfers are sent to primary storage while the virtual machine is stalled.

6. A computer-implemented method according to claim 1, wherein changing the provision of the cache size includes changing the provision of the cache size of a plurality of virtual machines within a host

7. A computer-implemented method according to claim 1, wherein the cache storage is allocated for use by a plurality of virtual machines located within a host.

13. A computer-implemented method according to claim 1, wherein stalling the virtual machine is performed by a hypervisor, stopping the sending of I/O data transfers from the virtual machine to cache storage.

14. A computer-implemented method according to claim 1, wherein stalling the virtual machine further includes allowing outstanding I/O data transfers between the virtual machine and the cache storage to complete.

15. A computer-implemented method according to claim 1, wherein I/O data transfers are sent to primary storage until the virtual machine transfers cache storage operations from one virtual machine to another.

16. A computer-implemented method according to claim 1, wherein provisioning the virtual machine with cache storage in the other host includes purging the virtual machine of all data transfer information associated with a prior host before resuming operations with cache storage associated with the other host.

8. A virtualized computing system comprising:

a plurality of virtual machines, wherein each virtual machine includes an input/output driver for intercepting input/output operations associated with the virtual machine;

a shared data cache; and

a cache provisioner communicating with the plurality of virtual machines and the shared data cache, the cache provisioner configured to allocate portions of the shared data cache to each virtual machine based on the cache storage capacity needed by individual virtual machines.

9. The virtualized computing system of claim 8, wherein the shared data cache is a flash memory device.

10. The virtualized computing system of claim 8, wherein each of the plurality of virtual machines further includes a cache management system configured to determine capacities required by individual virtual machines.

11. The virtualized computing system of claim 8, wherein the cache provisioner is configured to balance allocations among a plurality of virtual machines.

12. A computer-implemented method of transferring a virtual machine operating a virtual main storage drive within local cache storage from one host to another while operating system applications continue to operate, comprising:

stalling the virtual machine'"'"'s local cache storage operations;

transferring the virtual machine'"'"'s operations to another host;

provisioning the virtual machine with cache storage in the other host; and

resuming the operations of the virtual machine in the other host.

17. A computer-implemented method of dynamically and securely provisioning cache storage while operating system applications continue to operate, comprising:

stalling the virtual machine'"'"'s local cache storage operations;

changing the provision of cache storage space size; and

resuming the operations of the virtual machine with limited read capability in the provisioned cache storage space.

18. A computer implemented method according to claim 17, wherein the limited read capability includes only allowing a virtual machine to read from cache storage space that it has previously written to.

19. A virtualized computing system comprising:

a plurality of virtual machines, wherein each virtual machine includes an input/output driver for intercepting input/output operations associated with the virtual machine and a virtual disk representing a virtual main drive storage;

a shared data cache for access by the plurality of virtual machines that have portions of the cache allocated to individual machines for main drive storage that may change in size.

20. A virtualized computing system according to claim 19, further comprising a cache provisioner communicating with the plurality of virtual machines and the shared data cache, the cache provisioner configured to dynamically allocate portions of the shared data cache to each virtual machine based on the cache storage capacity needed by individual virtual machines.