Elastic offload of prebuilt traffic management system component virtual machines

• US 9,952,886 B2
• Filed: 12/27/2016
• Issued: 04/24/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 12/31/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: F5 Networks, Inc. (F5 Incorporated)
• Original Assignee: F5 Networks, Inc. (F5 Incorporated)
• Inventors: Masters, Richard Roderick, Blood, Brent Wayne, Szabo, Paul Imre, Bollay, Benn Sapin
• Primary Examiner(s): Swift, Charles M
• Application Number:
  US15/391,580
• Publication Number:
  US 20170220372A1
• Time in Patent Office: 483 Days
• Field of Search: None
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/45562 Creating, deleting, cloning virtual machine instances
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/4557 Distribution of virtual machine instances; Migration and load balancing
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/45591 Monitoring or debugging support
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/45595 Network integration; Enabling network access in virtual machine instances
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/455 Emulation; Interpretation; Software simulation, e.g. virtualisation or emulation of application or operating system execution engines
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45533 Hypervisors; Virtual machine monitors
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45541 Bare-metal, i.e. hypervisor runs directly on hardware
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45545 Guest-host, i.e. hypervisor is an application program itself, e.g. VirtualBox
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/4555 Para-virtualisation, i.e. guest operating system has to be modified
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45558 Hypervisor-specific management and integration aspects
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/48 Program initiating; Program switching, e.g. by interrupt
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/4843 by program, e.g. task dispatcher, supervisor, operating system
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/485 Task life-cycle, e.g. stopping, restarting, resuming execution G06F9/4881 takes precedence
• 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 9/4862 the task being a mobile agent, i.e. specifically designed to migrate
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/4868 with creation or replication
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/4881 Scheduling strategies for dispatcher, e.g. round robin, multi-level priority queues
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/50 Allocation of resources, e.g. of the central processing unit [CPU]
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5005 to service a request
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5027 the resource being a machine, e.g. CPUs, Servers, Terminals
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/505 : considering the load
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5055 : considering software capabilities, i.e. software resources associated or available to the machine
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5083 : Techniques for rebalancing the load in a distributed system
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5088 : involving task migration
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/08 : Monitoring or testing based on specific metrics, e.g. QoS, energy consumption or environmental parameters
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/10 : in which an application is distributed across nodes in the network software deployment G06F8/60; multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1008 : based on parameters of servers, e.g. available memory or workload monitoring of computer activity G06F11/30
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1031 : Controlling of the operation of servers by a load balancer, e.g. adding or removing servers that serve requests
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/34 : involving the movement of software or configuration parameters network booting or remote initial program loading [RIPL] G06F9/4416

Abstract

Embodiments are directed towards employing a traffic management system (TMS) that is enabled to deploy component virtual machines (CVM) to the cloud to perform tasks of the TMS. In some embodiments, a TMS may be employed with one or more CVMs. In at least one embodiment, the TMS may maintain an image of each CVM. Each CVM may be configured to perform one or more tasks, to operate in specific cloud infrastructures, or the like. The TMS may deploy one or more CVMs locally and/or to one or more public and/or private clouds. In some embodiments, deployment of the CVMs may be based on a type of task to be performed, anticipated resource utilization, customer policies, or the like. The deployment of the CVMs may be dynamically updated based on monitored usage patterns, task completions, customer policies, or the like.

Claims

1. A method for managing communication over a network, comprising:

employing a traffic management system (TMS) that includes one or more component virtual machines (CVMs), wherein each CVM is enabled to perform one or more tasks of the TMS;

deploying the one or more CVMs to one or more computing resources that are separate from the TMS to perform a low security task of the TMS;

locally deploying the one or more CVMs to perform a high security task of the TMS; and

monitoring usage patterns associated with each deployed CVM to determine a corresponding workload of each deployed CVM.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising initially locally deploying the one or more CVMs prior to deploying the one or more CVMs to the one or more separate computing resources based on a processing load of the one or more CVMs or the TMS.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising migrating the one or more CVMs back to being deployed locally after being deployed to the one or more separate computing resources.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more CVMs support one or more application programming interfaces that correspond to the one or more separate computing resources.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising dynamically updating the deployment of the one or more CVMs based on one or more of a workload of the one or more CVMs, or the monitored usage patterns for the one or more CVMs.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising employing the TMS to monitor a heartbeat for each of the one or more CVMs.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising deploying two or more CMS to form a cluster that work cooperatively to perform the one or more tasks.

8. An apparatus for managing communication over a network, comprising:

a transceiver configured to be capable of communicating packets over the network;

a memory that is configured to be capable of storing computer executable instructions;

one or processors that is configured to be capable of executing the instructions to perform actions, including;

managing packet flows over the network with one or more component virtual machines (CVMs), wherein each CVM is enabled to perform one or more tasks;

deploying the one or more CVMs to one or more computing resources that are separate from the apparatus to perform a low security task;

locally deploying the one or more CVMs to perform a high security task; and

monitoring usage patterns associated with each deployed CVM to determine a corresponding workload of each deployed CVM.

9. The apparatus of claim 8, further comprising initially locally deploying the one or more CVMs prior to deploying the one or more CVMs to the one or more separate computing resources based on a processing load of the one or more CVMs or the apparatus.

10. The apparatus of claim 8, further comprising migrating the one or more CVMs back to being deployed locally after being deployed to the one or more separate computing resources.

11. The apparatus of claim 8, wherein the one or more CVMs support one or more application programming interfaces that correspond to the one or more separate computing resources.

12. The apparatus of claim 8, further comprising dynamically updating the deployment of the one or more CVMs based on one or more of a workload of the one or more CVMs, or the monitored usage patterns for the one or more CVMs.

13. The apparatus of claim 8, further comprising monitoring a heartbeat for each of the one or more CVMs.

14. The apparatus of claim 8, further comprising deploying two or more CMS to form a cluster that work cooperatively to perform the one or more tasks.

15. A non-transitory computer readable storage medium having stored thereon instructions, wherein execution of the instructions by one of more processors of a traffic management system (TMS) performing actions, including:

managing packet flows over the network with one or more component virtual machines (CVMs), wherein each CVM is enabled to perform one or more tasks;

deploying the one or more CVMs to one or more computing resources that are separate from the apparatus to perform a low security task;

locally deploying the one or more CVMs to perform a high security task; and

monitoring usage patterns associated with each deployed CVM to determine a corresponding workload of each deployed CVM.

16. The medium of claim 15, further comprising initially locally deploying the one or more CVMs prior to deploying the one or more CVMs to the one or more separate computing resources based on a processing load of the one or more CVMs or the TMS.

17. The medium of claim 15, further comprising migrating the one or more CVMs back to being deployed locally after being deployed to the one or more separate computing resources.

18. The medium of claim 15, further comprising dynamically updating the deployment of the one or more CVMs based on one or more of a workload of the one or more CVMs, or the monitored usage patterns for the one or more CVMs.

19. The medium of claim 15, further comprising monitoring a heartbeat for each of the one or more CVMs.

20. The medium of claim 15, further comprising deploying two or more CMS to form a cluster that work cooperatively to perform the one or more tasks.