Applying update to snapshots of virtual machine

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2018225108-A1
Application number	US-201815947923-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Apr 9, 2018
Priority date	Oct 28, 2014
Publication date	Aug 9, 2018
Grant date	—

Abstract

For automatically applying update to snapshots of a virtual machine (VM), a cloned virtual machine is created reproducing a state of an existing first snapshot of a virtual machine, a first virtual NIC in the cloned VM is disabled, an update is applied to the cloned VM to which a second virtual NIC has been added, the second virtual NIC is deleted from the cloned VM to which the update has been applied, the first virtual NIC is enabled, and a second snapshot of the cloned VM is generated with the enabled first virtual NIC wherein the second snapshot is associated with the virtual machine.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . A computer method for applying program updates executed by a computer hardware processor, the method comprising:
creating a cloned virtual machine reproducing a state of an existing snapshot of a virtual machine; disabling a first virtual network interface card (NIC) in the cloned virtual machine; adding a second virtual NIC to the cloned virtual machine; applying an update to the cloned virtual machine having the added second virtual NIC; deleting the second virtual NIC from the updated cloned virtual machine; reenabling the first virtual NIC in the updated cloned virtual machine; and generating a new snapshot of the updated cloned virtual machine and the reenabled first virtual NIC.

2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein creating the cloned virtual machine further comprises:
selecting the existing snapshot of a plurality of existing snapshots based on, at least, a priority associated with the existing snapshot.

3 . The method of claim 1 , wherein creating the cloned virtual machine further comprises:
selecting the existing snapshot of a plurality of existing snapshots based on, at least, a usage frequency of the existing snapshot.

4 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
merging the new snapshot of the cloned virtual machine with a previously generated snapshot associated with the virtual machine.

5 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the adding the second virtual NIC to the cloned virtual machine further comprises:
initiating the cloned virtual machine to which the second virtual machine has been added; and assigning an unused IP address to the second virtual NIC.

6 . The method of claim 5 , wherein the applying the update to the cloned virtual machine having the added second virtual NIC comprises:
applying the update to the cloned virtual machine using the unused IP address assigned to the second virtual NIC.

7 . The method of claim 1 , wherein disabling the first virtual NIC in the cloned virtual machine comprises:
disconnecting the first virtual NIC from a network.

8 . The method of claim 1 , wherein disabling the first virtual NIC in the cloned virtual machine comprises:
preventing the first virtual NIC from being recognized by an operating system of the cloned virtual machine when the cloned virtual machine is initiated.

9 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the applied update comprises an update of a definition file for security software designed to maintain security for the cloned virtual machine.

10 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the new snapshot is a data set in which only information on differences from a directly preceding snapshot is stored.

11 . A computer program product for applying program updates, the computer program product comprising a non-transitory computer readable storage medium having program instructions stored thereon, the program instructions configured to be executed by a processor to cause the processor to perform a method comprising:
creating a cloned virtual machine reproducing a state of an existing snapshot of a virtual machine; disabling a first virtual network interface card (NIC) in the cloned virtual machine; adding a second virtual NIC to the cloned virtual machine; applying an update to the cloned virtual machine having the added second virtual NIC; deleting the second virtual NIC from the updated cloned virtual machine; reenabling the first virtual NIC in the updated cloned virtual machine; and generating a new snapshot of the updated cloned virtual machine and the reenabled first virtual NIC.

12 . The computer program product of claim 11 , wherein creating the cloned virtual machine further comprises:
selecting the existing snapshot of a plurality of existing snapshots based on, at least, a priority associated with the existing snapshot.

13 . The computer program product of claim 11 , wherein creating the cloned virtual machine further comprises:
selecting the existing snapshot of a plurality of existing snapshots based on, at least, a usage frequency of the existing snapshot.

14 . The computer program product of claim 1 , wherein the adding the second virtual NIC to the cloned virtual machine further comprises:
initiating the cloned virtual machine to which the second virtual machine has been added; and assigning an unused IP address to the second virtual NIC.

15 . The computer program product of claim 14 , wherein the applying the update to the cloned virtual machine having the added second virtual NIC comprises:
applying the update to the cloned virtual machine using the unused IP address assigned to the second virtual NIC.

16 . The computer program product of claim 11 , wherein the applied update comprises an update of a definition file for security software designed to maintain security for the cloned virtual machine.

17 . The computer program product of claim 11 , wherein the new snapshot is a data set in which only information on differences from a directly preceding snapshot is stored.

18 . A computer system for applying program updates, the computer system comprising:
a memory; and a processor coupled to the memory, the processor configured to obtain program instructions from the memory that cause the processor to perform a method comprising:
creating a cloned virtual machine reproducing a state of an existing snapshot of a virtual machine;
disabling a first virtual network interface card (NIC) in the cloned virtual machine;
adding a second virtual NIC to the cloned virtual machine;
applying an update to the cloned virtual machine having the added second virtual NIC;
deleting the second virtual NIC from the updated cloned virtual machine;
reenabling the first virtual NIC in the updated cloned virtual machine; and
generating a new snapshot of the updated cloned virtual machine and the reenabled first virtual NIC.

Assignees

• IBM

Inventors

• Fukui Yuto
• Hayashi Daisuke
• Shioya Tomohiro

Classifications

• G06F9/45558

  Hypervisor-specific management and integration aspects · CPC title

• G06F2009/45591

  Monitoring or debugging support · CPC title

• G06F2009/45562

  Creating, deleting, cloning virtual machine instances · CPC title

• G06F8/65 Primary

  Updates (security arrangements therefor G06F21/57) · CPC title