Virtual machine migration task management

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11194620-B2
Application number	US-201816176653-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Oct 31, 2018
Priority date	Oct 31, 2018
Publication date	Dec 7, 2021
Grant date	Dec 7, 2021

Abstract

Systems and methods for preferential treatment of a prioritized virtual machine during migration of a group of virtual machines from a first virtualized computing environment to a second virtualized computing environment. A data structure is allocated to store virtual machine migration task attributes that are associated with a plurality of in-process virtual machine migration tasks. As migration proceeds, the migration task attributes in the data structure are updated to reflect ongoing migration task scheduling adjustments and ongoing migration task resource allotments. A user interface or other process indicates a request to prioritize migration of a particular one of the to-be-migrated virtual machines. Based on the request, at least some of the virtual machine migration task attributes are modified to indicate a reduced scheduling priority of some of the to-be-migrated virtual machine migration tasks so as to preferentially deliver computing resources to the prioritized virtual machine migration tasks.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method for virtual machine migration task management, the method performed by a computer and comprising:
receiving a command to migrate a first virtualized entity from a source computing environment to a target computing environment, wherein a second virtualized entity is to be migrated from the source computing environment to the target computing environment;
generating a plurality of sets of virtual machine migration tasks,
wherein the plurality of sets of virtual machine migration tasks include:
first virtual machine migration tasks to perform migration of the first virtualized entity, and
second virtual machine migration tasks generated to perform migration of the second virtualized entity;
allocating a token to a virtual machine migration task of the first virtual machine migration tasks based on a relative priority assigned to the virtual machine migration task for the first virtualized entity and in accordance with a virtual machine migration state,
wherein the relative priority assigned to the virtual machine migration task of the first virtualized entity is different from a second relative priority assigned to a second virtual machine migration task of the second virtualized entity, and
wherein availability of the token for allocation is based at least in part on identifying an available computing resource and the token is allocated to the first virtual machine migration task in accordance with a corresponding scheduling priority assignment and the availability of the token; and

invoking execution of the first virtual machine migration task using a token-based scheduler and the allocated token.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the token corresponds to at least one of, a CPU resource token, a networking resource token, or a storage resource token, and a quantity of the token is determined based at least in part on availability of a computing resource.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first virtualized entity comprises at least one of, a virtual disk, or a virtual NIC.

4. The method of claim 1 , further comprising receiving a re-prioritization signal.

5. The method of claim 4 , wherein the re-prioritization signal derives from a user interface.

6. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
implementing a data structure to store a virtual machine migration task attribute, the virtual machine migration task attribute being associated with execution of the virtual machine migration task;
detecting a status change to the virtual machine migration task; and
updating the virtual machine migration task attribute recorded in the data structure, the virtual machine migration task attribute being updated based at least in part on the status change.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein the virtual machine migration task attribute corresponds to at least one of, a priority level, a token allocation, or status indicator.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein the source computing environment comprises a first hypervisor type and the target computing environment comprises a second hypervisor type.

9. A non-transitory computer readable medium having stored thereon a set of instructions which, when stored in memory and executed by a processor causes a set of acts for virtual machine migration task management, the set of acts comprising:
receiving a command to migrate a first virtualized entity from a source computing environment to a target computing environment, wherein a second virtualized entity is to be migrated from the source computing environment to the target computing environment;
generating a plurality of sets of virtual machine migration tasks,
wherein the plurality of sets of virtual machine migration tasks include:
first virtual machine migration tasks to perform migration of the first virtualized entity, and
second virtual machine migration tasks to perform migration of the second virtualized entity;
allocating a token to a virtual machine migration task of the first virtual machine migration tasks based on a relative priority assigned to the virtual machine migration task for the first virtualized entity and in accordance with a virtual machine migration state,
wherein the relative priority assigned to the virtual machine migration task of the first virtualized entity is different from a second relative priority assigned to a second virtual machine migration task of the second virtualized entity, and
wherein availability of the token for allocation is based at least in part on identifying an available computing resource and the token is allocated to the first virtual machine migration task in accordance with a corresponding scheduling priority assignment and the availability of the token; and

invoking execution of the first virtual machine migration task using a token-based scheduler and the allocated token.

10. The computer readable medium of claim 9 , wherein the token corresponds to at least one of, a CPU resource token, a networking resource token, or a storage resource token, and a quantity of the token is determined based at least in part on availability of a computing resource.

11. The computer readable medium of claim 9 , wherein the first virtualized entity comprises at least one of, a virtual disk, or a virtual NIC.

12. The computer readable medium of claim 9 , further comprising instructions which, when stored in memory and executed by the processor causes the processor to perform acts of receiving a re-prioritization signal.

13. The computer readable medium of claim 12 , wherein the re-prioritization signal derives from a user interface.

14. The computer readable medium of claim 9 , further comprising instructions which, when stored in memory and executed by processor causes the processor to perform acts of:
implementing a data structure to store a virtual machine migration task attribute, the virtual machine migration task attribute being associated with execution of the virtual machine migration task;
detecting a status change to the virtual machine migration task; and
updating the virtual machine migration task attribute recorded in the data structure, the virtual machine migration task attribute being updated based at least in part on the status change.

15. The computer readable medium of claim 14 , wherein the virtual machine migration task attribute corresponds to at least one of, a priority level, a token allocation, or status indicator.

16. The computer readable medium of claim 9 , wherein the source computing environment comprises a first hypervisor type and the target computing environment comprises a second hypervisor type.

17. A system for virtual machine migration task management, comprising:
a storage medium having stored thereon a set of instructions; and
a processor that executes the set of instructions to cause a set of acts, the set of acts comprising,
receiving a command to migrate a first virtualized entity from a source computing environment to a target computing environment, wherein a second virtualized entity is to be migrated from the source computing environment to the target computing environment;
generating a plurality of sets of virtual machine migration tasks,
wherein the plurality of sets of virtual machine migration tasks include:
first virtual machine migration tasks to perform migration of the first virtualized entity,
second virtual machine migration tasks generated to perform migration of the second virtualized entity;
allocating a token to a virtual machine migration task of the first virtual machine migration tasks based on a relative priority assigned to the

Assignees

• Nutanix Inc

Inventors

• Koehler Heiko Friedrich
• Narkhede Sameer
• Kothakota Venkatesh

Classifications

• G06F9/4856 Primary

  resumption being on a different machine, e.g. task migration, virtual machine migration (G06F9/5088 takes precedence) · CPC title

• G06F9/45558

  Hypervisor-specific management and integration aspects · CPC title

• G06F9/4881

  Scheduling strategies for dispatcher, e.g. round robin, multi-level priority queues · CPC title

• G06F2009/4557

  Distribution of virtual machine instances; Migration and load balancing · CPC title

• G06F9/45533

  Hypervisors; Virtual machine monitors · CPC title