Systems and methods for booting a bootable virtual storage appliance on a virtualized server platform using a hidden boot partition

• US 8,578,146 B2
• Filed: 06/09/2009
• Issued: 11/05/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 07/17/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Avago Technologies International Sales Pte Limited (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: LSI Corporation (Broadcom, Inc.)
• Inventors: Bert, Luca
• Primary Examiner(s): Lee, Thomas
• Assistant Examiner(s): CASSITY, ROBERT A
• Application Number:
  US13/003,058
• Publication Number:
  US 20110161649A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,610 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 713/2
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/45575 Starting, stopping, suspending or resuming virtual machine instances
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/4411 Configuring for operating with peripheral devices; Loading of device drivers
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/455 Emulation; Interpretation; Software simulation, e.g. virtualisation or emulation of application or operating system execution engines

Abstract

One embodiment is a method for booting a bootable virtual storage appliance on a virtualized server platform. One such method comprises: providing a virtual storage appliance on a server platform, the virtual storage appliance configured to manage a disk array comprising a plurality of disks, and wherein at least one of the disks comprises a hidden boot partition having a boot console; powering up the server platform; loading boot code on the server platform; loading the boot console from the hidden boot partition; and the boot console loading boot components for a virtualization environment.

Claims

1. A method for booting a bootable virtual storage appliance on a virtualized server platform, the method comprising:

providing a virtual storage appliance on a server platform, the virtual storage appliance configured to manage a disk array comprising a plurality of disks, and wherein at least one of the disks comprises a hidden boot partition having a boot console,

wherein providing the virtual storage appliance comprises installing the virtual storage appliance on the server platform by;

loading an installation package on the server platform, the installation package comprising an installation script for installing the virtual storage appliance, a boot console, and a management module,

running the installation script to create the hidden boot partition on the disk,

copying the boot console and the management module to the hidden boot partition;

powering up the server platform;

loading boot code on the server platform;

loading the boot console and the management module from the hidden boot partition; and

installing the virtual storage appliance using the boot console as a storage driver.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the virtual storage appliance comprises a guest operating system associated with the server platform.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the virtual storage appliance comprises a RAID controller.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the virtualization environment comprises a virtual machine monitor that supports the virtual storage appliance and a plurality of virtual machines executing different operating systems.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the boot code loads one of a BIOS environment or an EFI environment.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the disk array comprises a hard disk drive array.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the disk array comprises a storage area network.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the disk array comprises a RAID array.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising managing the virtual storage appliance.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein installing the virtual storage appliance on the server platform further comprises:

configuring the disk array via the management module; and

creating a hidden boot partition, and replicating the boot console and the management module, on each disk in the disk array.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the installation package is provided to the server platform via at least one of a compact disk, a digital video disk, and a flash memory device.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the installing the virtual storage appliance on the server platform further comprises rebooting the server platform.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein the rebooting the host server platform comprises:

loading the boot console and the management module from the hidden boot partition on one of the disks; and

the boot console loading the virtualization environment.