METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR CONFIGURING A HYPERVISOR DURING A DOWNTIME STATE

• US 20110088032A1
• Filed: 06/10/2008
• Published: 04/14/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 06/10/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Hewlett Packard Enterprise Development LP (Hewlett-Packard Enterprise Company)
• Original Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. (HP Inc.)
• Inventors: Dickson, MIke, Bonola, Thomas J., Garrett, Michael R., Hemphill, John M.
• Granted Patent: US 8,595,723 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 718/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/44505 Configuring for program initiating, e.g. using registry, configuration files
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45533 Hypervisors; Virtual machine monitors

Abstract

In one embodiment, a computer system comprises a host machine comprising a plurality of compute resources, at least one management processor, a hypervisor, at least one persistent state data store location coupled to the host machine, wherein the persistent state data store location stores configuration data for the hypervisor, and a persistent state module coupled to a management processor coupled to the host machine, wherein the persistent state module maps hypervisor configuration data to a persistent state data store.

Claims

1. A computer system, comprising:

a host machine comprising a plurality of compute resources;

at least one management processor;

a hypervisor;

at least one persistent state data store location coupled to the host machine, wherein the persistent state data store location stores configuration data for the hypervisor; and

a persistent state module coupled to a management processor coupled to the host machine, wherein the persistent state module maps hypervisor configuration data to a persistent state data store.

2. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the persistent state module allows the hypervisor configuration data to be modified when the host machine is running in an auxiliary power mode.

3. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the persistent state module hypervisor configuration data is coupled to the host machine through nonvolatile flash memory on the management processor.

4. The computer system of claim 1, wherein modification of the persistent state module hypervisor configuration data comprises:

monitoring hypervisor configuration data, by the hypervisor, when the host machine is powered up; and

modifying, by the hypervisor, the hypervisor configuration data when a modification is detected.

5. The computer system of claim 1, wherein a hyper^-visor configuration data modification request is received from a user.

6. The method according to claim 5, wherein a hypervisor configuration data modification request is received from an external software program.

7. A method to edit configuration data of a hypervisor comprising:

receiving, in a host machine, a hypervisor configuration data modification request;

initiating, in the host machine, a persistent state module on a management processor coupled to the persistent state data store;

reading, in the host machine, the current hypervisor configuration data from the persistent state data store coupled to the persistent state module on the host machine;

processing, in the host machine, the hypervisor configuration data modification request; and

writing, in the host machine, the edited hypervisor configuration data to the persistent state data store coupled to the persistent state module on the host machine.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein processing, in a host machine, the hypervisor configuration data modification request comprises:

monitoring hypervisor configuration data, by the hypervisor, when the host machine is powered up; and

modifying, by the hypervisor, the hypervisor configuration data when a modification is detected.

9. The method according to claim 7, wherein receiving, in a host machine, a hypervisor configuration data modification request comprises receiving the request by the persistent state module on the management processor when the host machine is in an auxiliary power mode.

10. The method according to claim 7, wherein receiving, in a host machine, a hypervisor configuration data modification request comprises receiving the request from a user.

11. The method according to claim 7, wherein receiving, in a host machine, a hypervisor configuration data modification request comprises receiving the request from an external software program.

12. The method according to claim 7, wherein receiving, in a host machine, a hypervisor configuration data modification request comprises receiving the request from a flash memory device added to the computer system replacing art earlier hypervisor configuration data on the persistent state data store.

13. The method according to claim 12, wherein the persistent state module on the management processor grants priority to the later added flash memory hypervisor configuration data over embedded hypervisor configuration data.

14. A computer program product comprising logic instructions stored on a computer-readable medium which, when executed by a computer processor, configure the processor to:

receive, in a host machine, a hypervisor configuration data modification request;

initiate, in the host machine, a persistent state module on a management processor coupled to the persistent state data store;

read, in the host machine, the current hypervisor configuration data from the persistent state data store coupled to the persistent state module on the host machine;

process, in the host machine, the hypervisor configuration data modification request; and

write, in the host machine, the edited hypervisor configuration data to the persistent state data store coupled to the persistent state module on the host machine.

15. The computer program product of claim 14, further comprising logic instructions stored in a computer-readable medium which, when executed by the processor, configure the processor to:

monitor hypervisor configuration data, by the hypervisor, when the host machine is powered up; and

modify, by the hypervisor, the hypervisor configuration data when a modification is detected.

16. The computer program product of claim 14, wherein a hypervisor configuration data modification request comprises receiving the request by the persistent state module on the management processor when the host machine is in auxiliary power mode.

17. The computer program product of claim 14, wherein a hypervisor configuration data modification request comprises receiving the request from a user.

18. The computer program product of claim 14, wherein the hypervisor configuration data modification request comprises receiving the request from an external software program.

19. The computer program product of claim 14, wherein the hypervisor configuration data modification request comprises receiving the request from a flash memory device added to the computer system replacing an earlier hypervisor configuration data on the persistent state data store.

20. The computer program product of claim 19, wherein the persistent state module on the management processor grants priority to the later added flash memory hypervisor configuration data over embedded hypervisor configuration data.