PERSONAL AND POOLED VIRTUAL MACHINE UPDATE

• US 20130152077A1
• Filed: 12/08/2011
• Published: 06/13/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 12/08/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Mehmood, Kashif, Hussain, Amjad, Ben-Shachar, Ido Miles, Sampath, Sriram, Kumar, Ajay, Leitman, Robert K.
• Granted Patent: US 8,769,519 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 718/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/45562 Creating, deleting, cloning virtual machine instances
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2209/504 Resource capping
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/65 Updates security arrangements therefor G06F21/57
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/452 Remote windowing, e.g. X-Window System, desktop virtualisation protocols for virtual reality H04L67/131
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5027 the resource being a machine, e.g. CPUs, Servers, Terminals
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 10/00 Energy efficient computing, e.g. low power processors, power management or thermal management

Abstract

The updating of virtual machines. A task broker schedules update tasks for multiple virtual machines on the host machine. As each update task is to be performed, if the virtual machine is not currently running, as might be the case for a personal virtual machine, the virtual machine is caused to begin running to allow the update task to be performed on the virtual machine. Also, a pooled virtual machine is updated by copying information from the old virtual hard drive to a location to allow the information to be preserved as the master image is updated. After the update is completed, the virtual machine is formed, associated with the new virtual hard drive, and copied back to the virtual machine.

Claims

1. A computer program product comprising one or more computer-storage media having thereon one or more computer-executable instructions that are structured such that, when executed by one or more processors of the computing system, cause the computing system to operate a task broker,

wherein the task broker is configured to schedule update tasks for a plurality of virtual machines that run on a host machine, and for at least some of the scheduled update task performing the following:

an act of determining that the update task should be performed;

an act of causing the virtual machine on which the update task is to be performed to begin running in preparation for updating the virtual machine; and

an act of causing the update task to be performed on the running virtual machine.

2. The computer program product in accordance with claim 1, wherein the task broker is configured to further determine an impact on the host machine before the act of causing the virtual machine to begin running

3. The computer program product in accordance with claim 1, wherein the task broker is configured to determine first how many prior virtual machines have begun running and are still running to perform update tasks prior to the act of causing the virtual machine to begin running

4. The computer program product in accordance with claim 1, wherein the task broker schedules the update task in response to a request from the virtual machine on which the update task is to be performed.

5. The computer program product in accordance with claim 4, wherein the task broker is also capable of receiving update tasks via a channel for performing update tasks urgently.

6. The computer program product in accordance with claim 1, wherein at least some of the update tasks include operating system upgrade tasks.

7. The computer program product in accordance with claim 1, wherein at least some of the update tasks include application installation instructions.

8. The computer program product in accordance with claim 1, wherein at least some of the update tasks include application upgrade instructions.

9. The computer program product in accordance with claim 1, wherein at least some of the update tasks include system configuration instructions.

10. The computer program product in accordance with claim 1, wherein the virtual machine is a personal virtual machine.

11. A method for performing an update on a pooled virtual machine, the method comprising:

an act of updating a master image associated with the pooled virtual machine;

an act of copying information from a first virtual hard drive that is associated with the pooled virtual machine to a location external to the first virtual hard drive;

after the act of copying, an act of disconnecting the pooled virtual machine from the first virtual hard drive;

an act of associating the pooled virtual machine with a second virtual hard drive that is associated with the updated master image; and

after the act of associating, an act of copying at least some of the information copied from the first virtual hard drive back into the second virtual hard drive.

12. The method in accordance with claim 11, wherein the act of updating the master image comprises at least one of the following on the master image:

an act of performing an operating system upgrade;

an act of performing an application installation;

an act of performing an application upgrade; and

an act of performing a system re-configuration.

13. The method in accordance with claim 11, wherein the method is performed at least in part by a virtual machine host on which the master image resides and that hosts a plurality of pooled virtual machines.

14. The method in accordance with claim 11, wherein the location is a pre-determined folder.

15. The method in accordance with claim 11, wherein the location is a pre-determined system memory location.

16. A computer program product comprising one or more computer-storage media having thereon one or more computer-executable instructions that are structured such that, when executed by one or more processors of the computing system, cause the computing system to operate a virtual machine,

wherein the virtual machine is configured to receive an update task to be performed on the virtual machine, and notify a task broker that the update task is to be performed on the virtual machine, and

wherein if the virtual machine is not running when the update task is to be performed, the virtual machine is configured to respond to an instruction to begin running from the task broker, and perform the update task upon instruction from the task broker.

17. The computer program product in accordance with claim 16,

wherein the virtual machine includes a trigger agent and an update agent, wherein the update agent receives the update task to be performed on the virtual machine, and the trigger agent communicates with the task broker by notifying the task broker of the update task and receiving the instruction to perform the update task from the task broker when it is time to perform the update, wherein the update agent performs the update task on the virtual machine.

18. The computer program product in accordance with claim 17, wherein the update agent is a first update agent that performs updates to the virtual machine by a first entity, the virtual machine further including a second update agent that performs updates to the virtual machine by a second entity.

19. The computer program product in accordance with claim 18, wherein the first update agent and the second update agent use a common interface to communicate with the trigger agent.

20. The computer program product in accordance with claim 16, wherein the virtual machine communicates with the task broker indirectly through a virtual machine host agent.