Capacity risk management for virtual machines

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2017046192-A1
Application number	US-201615335350-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Oct 26, 2016
Priority date	Jun 30, 2014
Publication date	Feb 16, 2017
Grant date	—

Abstract

An access data collector collects access assignment data characterizing active access assignment operations of a hypervisor in assigning host computing resources among virtual machines for use in execution of the virtual machines. Then, a capacity risk indicator calculator calculates a capacity risk indicator characterizing a capacity risk of the host computing resources with respect to meeting a prospective capacity demand of the virtual machines, based on the access assignment data

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . A system including a non-transitory computer readable storage medium storing instructions executable by at least one processor, the system comprising:
a data collector configured to cause the at least one processor to collect data characterizing assignment operations of a hypervisor in assigning host computing resources among a plurality of virtual machines for use in execution of the plurality of virtual machines; and a plurality of capacity risk indicator calculators configured to cause the at least one processor to,
determine, for each host computing resource, an initial capacity risk assessment,
determine, for a portion of the host computing resources, an updated capacity risk assessment, the updated capacity risk assessment being based on at least one pressure metric calculation performed in response to determining additional sources of saturation risk for a corresponding host computing resource, and
generate an overall capacity risk assessment for each host computing resource based on the initial capacity risk assessment and the updated capacity risk assessment.

2 . The system of claim 1 , wherein the initial capacity risk assessment uses utilization data retrieved by a utilization monitor.

3 . The system of claim 2 , wherein the initial capacity risk assessment uses predefined minimum and maximum thresholds values to assess the utilization data.

4 . The system of claim 1 , wherein the updated capacity risk assessment includes calculating risk indicators for a portion of the host computing resources, the risk indicators including performance of pressure metrics associated with active memory, consumed memory, memory over-commitment, CPU utilization, and storage utilization.

5 . The system of claim 1 , wherein the updated capacity risk assessment is determined for a plurality of clusters including two or more of the host computing resources.

6 . The system of claim 1 , wherein penalty points are added to at least one assessment in response to detecting wait times above a predefined maximum time threshold associated with a processing time for a cluster, the penalty points indicating an increased likelihood of the cluster becoming saturated.

7 . A method comprising:
determining, for each host computing resource, an initial capacity risk assessment, determining, for a portion of the host computing resources, an updated capacity risk assessment, the updated capacity risk assessment being based on at least one pressure metric calculation performed in response to determining additional sources of saturation risk for a corresponding host computing resource, and generating an overall capacity risk assessment for each host computing resource based on the initial capacity risk assessment and the updated capacity risk assessment.

8 . The method of claim 7 , further comprising collecting data characterizing assignment operations of a hypervisor in assigning the host computing resource among a plurality of virtual machines for use in execution of the plurality of virtual machines.

9 . The method of claim 7 , wherein the initial capacity risk assessment uses utilization data retrieved by a utilization monitor.

10 . The method of claim 9 , wherein the initial capacity risk assessment uses predefined minimum and maximum thresholds values to assess the utilization data.

11 . The method of claim 7 , wherein the updated capacity risk assessment includes calculating risk indicators for a portion of the host computing resources, the risk indicators including performance of pressure metrics associated with active memory, consumed memory, memory over-commitment, CPU utilization, and storage utilization.

12 . The method of claim 7 , wherein the updated capacity risk assessment is determined for a plurality of clusters including two or more of the host computing resources.

13 . The method of claim 7 , wherein penalty points are added to at least one assessment in response to detecting wait times above a predefined maximum time threshold associated with a processing time for a cluster, the penalty points indicating an increased likelihood of the cluster becoming saturated.

14 . A computer program product including instructions recorded on a non-transitory computer readable storage medium and configured, when executed by at least one processor, to cause the at least one processor to:
determine, for each host computing resource, an initial capacity risk assessment, determine, for a portion of the host computing resources, an updated capacity risk assessment, the updated capacity risk assessment being based on at least one pressure metric calculation performed in response to determining additional sources of saturation risk for a corresponding host computing resource, and generate an overall capacity risk assessment for each host computing resource based on the initial capacity risk assessment and the updated capacity risk assessment.

15 . The computer program product of claim 14 , further comprising collecting data characterizing assignment operations of a hypervisor in assigning the host computing resource among a plurality of virtual machines for use in execution of the plurality of virtual machines.

16 . The computer program product of claim 14 , wherein the initial capacity risk assessment uses utilization data retrieved by a utilization monitor.

17 . The computer program product of claim 16 , wherein the initial capacity risk assessment uses predefined minimum and maximum thresholds values to assess the utilization data.

18 . The computer program product of claim 14 , wherein the updated capacity risk assessment includes calculating risk indicators for a portion of the host computing resources, the risk indicators including performance of pressure metrics associated with active memory, consumed memory, memory over-commitment, CPU utilization, and storage utilization.

19 . The computer program product of claim 14 , wherein the updated capacity risk assessment is determined for a plurality of clusters including two or more of the host computing resources.

20 . The computer program product of claim 14 , wherein penalty points are added to at least one assessment in response to detecting wait times above a predefined maximum time threshold associated with a processing time for a cluster, the penalty points indicating an increased likelihood of the cluster becoming saturated.

Assignees

• Bmc Software Inc

Inventors

• Sivasubramanian Jeyashree
• Apte Sudheer

Classifications

• G06F11/3433 Primary

  for load management (allocation of a server based on load conditions G06F9/505; load rebalancing G06F9/5083; redistributing the load in a network by a load balancer H04L67/1029) · CPC title

• G06F9/5077

  Logical partitioning of resources; Management or configuration of virtualized resources (specific details on emulation or internal functioning of virtual machines G06F9/455) · CPC title

• G06F11/301

  where the computing system is a virtual computing platform, e.g. logically partitioned systems (virtual machines G06F9/45533; logical partitioning of resources G06F9/5077) · CPC title

• G06F11/3442

  for planning or managing the needed capacity · CPC title

• G06F11/3065

  Monitoring arrangements determined by the means or processing involved in reporting the monitored data (error or fault reporting or logging G06F11/0766) · CPC title