Streamlined guest networking in a virtualized environment

• US 8,335,237 B1
• Filed: 12/14/2011
• Issued: 12/18/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 09/08/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc. (Amazon.com, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc. (Amazon.com, Inc.)
• Inventors: Vincent, Pradeep
• Primary Examiner(s): Duong, Frank
• Application Number:
  US13/325,461
• Time in Patent Office: 370 Days
• Field of Search: 370229-231, 370/235, 370/351, 370/394, 3703955-39552, 370463-477
• US Class Current: 370/474
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/12 Protocol engines
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/161 Implementation details of TCP/IP or UDP/IP stack architecture; Specification of modified or new header fields
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/166 IP fragmentation; TCP segmentation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/32 Architecture of open systems interconnection [OSI] 7-layer type protocol stacks, e.g. the interfaces between the data link level and the physical level

Abstract

Networking speed in a virtualized environment can be improved by utilizing an enhanced protocol and parallel stack to bypass restrictions of a conventional network stack that complies with standard networking protocols. In one embodiment, an enhanced TCP protocol enables large packets received from a guest application to bypass the guest networking stack and be received to a bottom conversion layer of the enhanced stack, which is able to segment the packet into appropriately sized segments that conform to the conventional protocol. These segments can be passed to a network interface card (NIC) or other device for encapsulation, framing, or other such processing to be transmitted to the destination as Ethernet frames or other such packets.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method for processing data packets in an electronic environment, comprising:

under control of one or more computer systems configured with executable instructions,

receiving a packet to a transmit-side conversion layer of an enhanced network stack of a host machine, the packet including network data packetized using an enhanced transmission protocol to enable the packet to be transmitted through the enhanced network stack using a larger packet size than is able to be transmitted using a conventional transmission protocol;

at the transmit-side conversion layer, determining a maximum packet size that can be processed by a network interface of the host machine and segmenting the data packet into segments of at most the maximum packet size, the segments being formatted using the conventional transmission protocol; and

forwarding the segments to the network interface, the network interface being operable to transmit the segments to an external location.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the conventional transmission protocol is a transmission control protocol (TCP) or a user datagram protocol (UDP).

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the network data is received to a guest operating system within a virtual environment executing on the host machine.

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the packet is transmitted through the enhanced network stack while bypassing a conventional network stack, the transmitting adhering to rules laid out by at least one conventional transmission protocol while violating at least one of semantics and syntax for the conventional transmission protocol.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the segments are framed as Ethernet frames at the transmit-side conversion layer or at the network interface.

6. A computer-implemented method for processing data packets in an electronic environment, comprising:

under control of one or more computer systems configured with executable instructions,

receiving a packet to a bottom transmit-side conversion layer of a first network stack, the packet being packetized using a first transmission protocol enabling the packet to be transmitted by the first network stack using a first packet size;

at the bottom transmit-side conversion layer, determining a second size corresponding to a size limit for a second transmission protocol and segmenting the data packet into segments of at most the second size, the segments being formatted using the second transmission protocol; and

forwarding the segments to a network interface operable to transmit the segments to an external location.

7. The computer-implemented method of claim 6, wherein the first protocol is an enhanced transmission control protocol (TCP) or an enhanced user datagram protocol (UDP), and wherein the second protocol is conventional TCP or conventional UDP.

8. The computer-implemented method of claim 6, wherein the segments are framed as Ethernet frames at the bottom transmit-side conversion layer or at the network interface.

9. The computer-implemented method of claim 6, wherein the packet is received from an application executing on a guest operating system within a virtual environment.

10. A computer-implemented method for processing data packets in an electronic environment, comprising:

under control of one or more computer systems configured with executable instructions,

receiving a plurality of packets to a network interface of a host machine, the packets including network data and being received using a conventional transmission protocol;

forwarding the network data for the plurality of packets to a bottom receive-side conversion layer of an enhanced network stack of the host machine, the bottom conversion layer operable to aggregate and packetize at least some of the network data into an enhanced packet using an enhanced transmission protocol, the enhanced transmission protocol enabling the network data to be transmitted through the enhanced network stack using a larger packet size than can be transmitted using the conventional transmission protocol; and

transmitting the enhanced packet through the enhanced network stack of the host machine and bypassing a conventional network stack.

11. The computer-implemented method of claim 10, wherein the network data of the enhanced packet is able to be extracted at a guest operating system receiving the enhanced packet through the enhanced network stack.

12. The computer-implemented method of claim 11, wherein the host machine corresponds to a hypervisor and the guest operating system executes within a virtual machine effectuated by the hypervisor.

13. The computer-implemented method of claim 10, wherein the plurality of packets are framed as Ethernet frames, the method further comprising:

removing framing of received frames at the bottom receive-side conversion layer or at the network interface.

14. The computer-implemented method of claim 10, wherein the enhanced packet is transmitted through the enhanced network stack while adhering to rules laid out by at least one conventional transmission protocol but violating at least one of semantics or syntax for the conventional transmission protocol.

15. The computer-implemented method of claim 10, wherein the conventional transmission protocol is a transmission control protocol (TCP) or a user datagram protocol (UDP).

16. A system for processing data packets in an electronic environment, comprising:

a processor;

a network interface; and

a memory device including instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the system to;

receive a plurality of packets to the network interface, the packets including network data and being received using a conventional transmission protocol;

forward the network data for the plurality of packets to a bottom receive-side conversion layer of an enhanced network stack, the bottom conversion layer configured to aggregate and packetize at least some of the network data into an enhanced packet using an enhanced transmission protocol, the enhanced transmission protocol enabling the network data to be transmitted through the enhanced network stack using a larger packet size than can be transmitted using the conventional transmission protocol; and

transmit the enhanced packet using the enhanced network stack and bypassing a conventional network stack.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the network data of the enhanced packet is able to be extracted at a guest operating system that receives the enhanced packet through the enhanced network stack.

18. The system of claim 16, wherein the plurality of packets are framed as Ethernet frames and the instructions when executed further cause the system to:

remove framing of received frames at the receive-side conversion layer or at the network interface.

19. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium including instructions for processing data packets in an electronic environment, the instructions when executed by a processor of a computer system causing the computer system to:

receive a plurality of packets to a network interface of a host machine, the packets including network data and being received using a conventional transmission protocol;

forward the network data for the plurality of packets to a bottom receive-side conversion layer of an enhanced network stack of the host machine, the bottom conversion layer configured to aggregate and packetize at least some of the network data into an enhanced packet using an enhanced transmission protocol, the enhanced transmission protocol enabling the network data to be transmitted through the enhanced network stack using a larger packet size than can be transmitted using the conventional transmission protocol; and

transmit the enhanced packet using the enhanced network stack of the host machine and bypassing a conventional network stack.

20. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 19, wherein the conventional transmission protocol is a transmission control protocol (TCP) or a user datagram protocol (UDP).

21. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 19, wherein the network data of the enhanced packet is able to be extracted at a guest operating system receiving the enhanced packet through the enhanced network stack in a virtualized environment.

22. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 21, wherein the host machine corresponds to a hypervisor and the guest operating system executes within a virtual machine effectuated by the hypervisor.

23. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 19, wherein the enhanced packet is transmitted through the enhanced network stack while adhering to rules laid out by at least one conventional transmission protocol but violating at least one of semantics or syntax for the conventional transmission protocol.