Scalable services deployment

• US 9,189,285 B2
• Filed: 12/14/2012
• Issued: 11/17/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 12/14/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Inventors: Ng, Samuel, Swenson, Jake Carver, Bomfim, Rodrigo Maialle, Hegde, Rajesh Kutpadi, Kudli, Prasanna, Kucer, Anton
• Primary Examiner(s): Lee, Tammy
• Application Number:
  US13/716,066
• Publication Number:
  US 20140173594A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,068 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/4557 Distribution of virtual machine instances; Migration and load balancing
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45533 Hypervisors; Virtual machine monitors
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45558 Hypervisor-specific management and integration aspects
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/4856 resumption being on a different machine, e.g. task migration, virtual machine migration G06F9/5088 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/505 considering the load
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5077 Logical partitioning of resources; Management or configuration of virtualized resources specific details on emulation or internal functioning of virtual machines G06F9/455
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4516 involving client characteristics, e.g. Set-Top-Box type, software version or amount of memory available
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6125 involving transmission via Internet transmission by internet of broadcast information H04H60/82

Abstract

Embodiments provide an abstraction on top of virtual machine allocation APIs to expose scalable services. The services are higher level components that expose a particular set of functionalities. A deployment manager handles matching and managing virtual machine allocations in order to meet the customer demands for the managed services. A deployment service exposes a “service” as a unit of resource allocation in a distributed computing environment or cloud computing service. Client components interact with the deployment service to request new service instances to meet customer demand.

Claims

1. In a computer system having a processor and a memory, the memory having program instructions stored thereon that, upon execution by the processor, cause the computer system to deploy a distributed computing service, a method comprising:

receiving a service package for a service to be provided to one or more clients via one or more virtual machines, the service package comprising an Operating System (OS) image and a set of configuration options, wherein the configuration options include;

a plurality of service certificates usable for authentication, a network configuration information, a set of available regions, a virtual machine size, and a package name, wherein the service certificates include a list of certificates and corresponding certificate passwords to be installed on one or more virtual machines, wherein the network configuration information includes a list of network ports to be exposed upon deployment of a given virtual machine, and wherein the set of available regions lists cloud service regions and an image name for each region where the service is deployed;

allocating two or more package instances to the service package on the distributed computing service, the package instances representing different instantiations of the service package; and

creating one or more service instances for each package instance in response to the one or more clients requesting access to the service, wherein each service instance is associated with a corresponding one of the package instances allocated to the virtual machine.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing endpoint information and connection credentials to the one or more clients for access to a given one of the service instances.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the receiving, allocating, and creating are each performed in response to instructions.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

allocating additional package instances to create additional virtual machines on the distributed computing service to maintain a client bandwidth requirement.

5. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

creating additional service instances in response to additional client requests for access to the service.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

monitoring a status of each package instance using heartbeat messages.

7. A computer system comprising:

one or more processors; and

a memory coupled to the one or more processors, the memory having instructions stored thereon that, upon execution by the one or more processors, cause the computer system to;

receive a service package for a service to be provided to one or more clients via one or more virtual machines, the service package comprising an Operating System (OS) image and a set of configuration options, wherein the configuration options include;

a plurality of service certificates usable for authentication, a network configuration information, a set of available regions, a virtual machine size, and a package name, wherein the service certificates include a list of certificates and corresponding certificate passwords to be installed on one or more virtual machines, wherein the network configuration information includes a list of network ports to be exposed upon deployment of a given virtual machine, and wherein the set of available regions lists cloud service regions for each region where the service is deployed;

allocate two or more package instances to the service package, the package instances representing different instantiations of the service package; and

create one or more service instances for each package instance in response to the one or more clients requesting access to the service, wherein each service instance is associated with a corresponding one of the package instances allocated to the virtual machine.

8. The computer system of claim 7, wherein the instructions, upon execution by the one or more processors, further cause the computer system to:

provide bidirectional communication, via a host on each virtual machine, between the virtual machine and a provider.

9. The computer system of claim 7, wherein the instructions, upon execution by the processor, further cause the computer system to receive the service package from a provider.

10. The computer system of claim 7, wherein the instructions, upon execution by the processor, further cause the computer system to create two or more service instances based upon each of the two or more package instances in response to a client requesting access to the service.

11. The computer system of claim 7, wherein the instructions, upon execution by the processor, further cause the computer system to receive heartbeat messages from a given package instance to monitor a status of the given package instance.

12. The computer system of claim 7, wherein the instructions, upon execution by the processor, further cause the computer system to provide endpoint information and connection credentials to clients for access to the service instances.

13. A memory having computer-executable instructions stored thereon that, upon execution by at least one processor of a computer system, cause the computer system to:

deploy a service instance on a virtual machine in response to a client requesting to subscribe to a streaming media service, the service instance configured by a service provider to provide the streaming media service at a requested bandwidth level using a service package comprising an Operating System (OS) image and a set of configuration options, wherein the configuration options include;

a plurality of service certificates usable for authentication, a network configuration information, a set of available regions, a virtual machine size, and a package name, wherein the service certificates include a list of certificates and corresponding certificate passwords to be installed on one or more virtual machines, wherein the network configuration information includes a list of network ports to be exposed upon deployment of a given virtual machine, and wherein the set of available regions lists cloud service regions and image names for each region where the service is deployed;

allocate two or more package instances to the service package, the package instances representing different instantiations of the service package, wherein each service instance is associated with a corresponding one of the package instances allocated to the virtual machine;

and

expose a service instance service endpoint for the client to provide access to the streaming media service.

14. The memory device of claim 13, wherein the computer-executable instructions, upon execution by the at least one processor, further cause the computer system to:

receive requests to subscribe to a streaming media service from additional clients;

deploy additional service instances, each of the additional service instances configured to provide a streaming media service requested by an additional client.

15. The memory device of claim 13, wherein the computer-executable instructions, upon execution by the at least one processor, further cause the computer system to:

in response to demand levels, deploy one or more additional service instances for the streaming media service on one or more additional virtual machines to maintain the bandwidth level requested by the client.

16. The memory device of claim 13, wherein the computer-executable instructions, upon execution by the at least one processor, further cause the computer system to:

monitor a health status of the virtual machines; and

deploy an additional service instance on a new virtual machine in response to failure of another virtual machine, the additional service instance supporting the same streaming media service at the bandwidth level provided by the failed virtual machine.

17. The memory device of claim 13, wherein the computer-executable instructions, upon execution by the at least one processor, further cause the computer system to:

update the virtual machine without interrupting service availability for the streaming media.

18. The memory device of claim 13, wherein the computer-executable instructions, upon execution by the at least one processor, further cause the computer system to:

pre-allocate a service instance supporting the streaming media service on a pre-allocated virtual machine prior to receiving the client request for the streaming media service; and

configure the pre-allocated virtual machine to provide the streaming media service at the bandwidth level in response to the client request.