INDEPENDENT ACCESS TO VIRTUAL MACHINE DESKTOP CONTENT

• US 20180143845A1
• Filed: 01/04/2018
• Published: 05/24/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 01/27/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Omnissa, LLC
• Original Assignee: VMware, Inc. (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Inventors: Chawla, Puneet, Chamcham, Jad
• Granted Patent: US 11,188,366 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/182 Distributed file systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/45591 Monitoring or debugging support
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/45595 Network integration; Enabling network access in virtual machine instances
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/6218 to a system of files or objects, e.g. local or distributed file system or database
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45533 Hypervisors; Virtual machine monitors
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45558 Hypervisor-specific management and integration aspects

Abstract

Methods, systems, and techniques for facilitating access to content stored remotely, for example, as part of a virtual machine infrastructure or elsewhere in a networked environment, using a uniform mechanism are provided. Example embodiments provide an Enhanced Virtual Desktop Management Server/System with a Content Abstraction Layer which enables users to access their data stored as part of a virtual machine environment, or replicated otherwise on a network, using a generic API. The API can be incorporated into a web browser or other third party interface to provide access to the users'"'"' data without needing to remote a bitmap representation of a virtual desktop display. Accordingly, users can access their data, applications, and settings regardless of the type of access device and regardless of whether the corresponding virtual desktop is running in the data center, provisioned in the datacenter but running on a client device, or not running at all.

Claims

1. A system comprising:

one or more computing devices including one or more memories and one or more computer processors configured to perform operations comprising;

receiving a client application request from a client device for user data stored in a remote location from the client device;

determining that the requested user data is stored on a virtual disk belonging to a non-running virtual machine;

in response to determining that the requested user data is stored on a virtual disk belonging to a non-running virtual machine, determining a control virtual machine comprising;

determining an identity of the virtual machine that corresponds to the virtual disk containing the requested data;

determining a storage volume that contains the virtual disk of the identified virtual machine;

identifying one or more hypervisors that have access to the identified storage volume; and

selecting a control virtual machine from a plurality of control virtual machines, wherein the selected control virtual machine runs on one of the one or more hypervisors;

causing the control virtual machine to access the requested user data; and

providing requested user data.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein determining the identity of the virtual machine includes looking up an identification of one or more virtual disks of an associated user.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein in response to determining that there is more than one virtual disk available to the user, requesting a user selection of an appropriate virtual disk.

4. The system of claim 2, wherein the request for user data includes a data path and using the data path to determine the particular virtual disk associated with the user.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein selecting the control virtual machine includes instantiating a new control virtual machine in response to determining that a control virtual machine is not running on the identified one or more hypervisors.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein causing the control virtual machine to access the requested user data includes mounting the virtual disk to the selected control virtual machine.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein causing the control virtual machine to access the requested user data includes powering on the control virtual machine to gain access to the requested data.

8. A method comprising:

receiving a client application request from a client device for user data stored in a remote location from the client device;

determining that the requested user data is stored on a virtual disk belonging to a non-running virtual machine;

in response to determining that the requested user data is stored on a virtual disk belonging to a non-running virtual machine, determining a control virtual machine comprising;

determining an identity of the virtual machine that corresponds to the virtual disk containing the requested data;

determining a storage volume that contains the virtual disk of the identified virtual machine;

identifying one or more hypervisors that have access to the identified storage volume; and

selecting a control virtual machine from a plurality of control virtual machines, wherein the selected control virtual machine runs on one of the one or more hypervisors;

causing the control virtual machine to access the requested user data; and

providing requested user data.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein determining the identity of the virtual machine includes looking up an identification of one or more virtual disks of an associated user.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein in response to determining that there is more than one virtual disk available to the user, requesting a user selection of an appropriate virtual disk.

11. The method of claim 9, wherein the request for user data includes a data path and using the data path to determine the particular virtual disk associated with the user.

12. The method of claim 8, wherein selecting the control virtual machine includes instantiating a new control virtual machine in response to determining that a control virtual machine is not running on the identified one or more hypervisors.

13. The method of claim 8, wherein causing the control virtual machine to access the requested user data includes mounting the virtual disk to the selected control virtual machine.

14. The method of claim 8, wherein causing the control virtual machine to access the requested user data includes powering on the control virtual machine to gain access to the requested data.

15. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium containing instructions that control a computer processor in a computing system to perform a method comprising:

receiving a client application request from a client device for user data stored in a remote location from the client device;

determining that the requested user data is stored on a virtual disk belonging to a non-running virtual machine;

in response to determining that the requested user data is stored on a virtual disk belonging to a non-running virtual machine, determining a control virtual machine comprising;

determining an identity of the virtual machine that corresponds to the virtual disk containing the requested data;

determining a storage volume that contains the virtual disk of the identified virtual machine;

identifying one or more hypervisors that have access to the identified storage volume; and

selecting a control virtual machine from a plurality of control virtual machines, wherein the selected control virtual machine runs on one of the one or more hypervisors;

causing the control virtual machine to access the requested user data; and

providing requested user data.

16. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 15, wherein determining the identity of the virtual machine includes looking up an identification of one or more virtual disks of an associated user.

17. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 16, wherein in response to determining that there is more than one virtual disk available to the user, requesting a user selection of an appropriate virtual disk.

18. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 16, wherein the request for user data includes a data path and using the data path to determine the particular virtual disk associated with the user.

19. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 15, wherein selecting the control virtual machine includes instantiating a new control virtual machine in response to determining that a control virtual machine is not running on the identified one or more hypervisors.

20. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 15, wherein causing the control virtual machine to access the requested user data includes mounting the virtual disk to the selected control virtual machine.