Protecting virtual computing instances from network failures

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2019075036-A1
Application number	US-201715695882-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Sep 5, 2017
Priority date	Sep 5, 2017
Publication date	Mar 7, 2019
Grant date	—

Abstract

The subject matter described herein provides virtual computing instance (VCI) component protection against networking failures in a datacenter cluster. Networking routes at the host level, VCI level, and application level are monitored for connectivity. Failures are communicated to a primary host or to a datacenter virtualization infrastructure that initiates policy-based remediation, such as moving affected VCIs to another host in the cluster that has all the necessary networking routes functional.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . A system for virtual computing instance (VCI) component protection for networking, said system comprising:
at least one physical processor; and at least one memory comprising computer program code, the at least one memory and the computer program code configured to, with the at least one physical processor, cause the processor to at least:
evaluate a networking health status associated with a first host executing the VCI, the evaluating comprising:
pinging, via a first command, a set of network addresses from a first virtual network interface available to the first host, and
pinging, via a second command, the set of network addresses from a second virtual network interface available to the VCI;

define the networking health status based on the evaluation, the defining comprises identifying which of the set of network addresses are reachable; and
initiate a remediation action for the first host based on the defined networking health status.

2 . The system of claim 1 wherein, evaluating the networking health status of the first host further comprises determining a health status of a management networking route for communication between the first host and a datacenter virtualization infrastructure.

3 . The system of claim 1 wherein, evaluating the networking health status of the first host further comprises determining a health status of a kernel networking route for communication between the first host and a datastore, wherein a host management process monitors the kernel networking route and determines whether the first host continues to maintain accessibility to the datastore.

4 . The system of claim 3 wherein, the kernel networking route further comprises one or more of the following: a fault tolerance (FT) logging route, a virtual storage attached network (vSAN) route, and a network route used for VCI migration.

5 . The system of claim 1 , wherein initiating the remediation is performed by a second host, and wherein the second host selects a third host based on a networking health status associated with the third host, and initiates migration of the VCI executing on the first host to the selected third host.

6 . The system of claim 1 further comprising determining whether the set of network addresses is reachable by a plurality of VCIs, and shutting down the plurality of the VCIs upon determining that the set of network addresses are not reachable by more than a pre-defined number of VCIs of the plurality of VCIs executing on the first host and re-starting the plurality of the VCIs on a host other than the first host.

7 . The system of claim 1 , wherein the set of network addresses includes an address of at least an object needed for operation of the VCI or the first host, and wherein upon determining that the object is unreachable by the VCI or the first host, initiating remediation.

8 . A method for virtual computing instance (VCI) component protection for networking, said method comprising:
evaluating a networking health status associated with a first host executing the VCI, the evaluating comprising:
pinging a set of network addresses from a virtual network interface available to the first host, and
pinging the set of network addresses from the VCI;
defining the networking health status based on the evaluation, the defining comprises identifying which of the set of network addresses are reachable; and initiating remediation for the first host based on the defined networking health status.

9 . The method of claim 8 wherein, evaluating the networking health status of the first host further comprises determining a health status of a management networking route for communication between the first host and a datacenter virtualization infrastructure.

10 . The method of claim 8 wherein, evaluating the networking health status of the first host further comprises determining a health status of a kernel networking route for communication between the first host and a datastore.

11 . The method of claim 10 wherein, the kernel networking route further comprises one or more of the following: a fault tolerance (FT) logging route, a virtual storage attached network (vSAN) route, and a network route used for VCI migration.

12 . The method of claim 8 , wherein initiating the remediation is performed by a second host, and wherein the second host selects a third host based on a networking health status associated with the third host, and initiates migration of the VCI executing on the first host to the selected third host.

13 . The method of claim 8 further comprising determining accessibility of a plurality of VCIs executing on the first host to the set of network addresses, shutting down the plurality of the VCIs upon determining that the set of network addresses are not reachable by more than a pre-defined number of VCIs of the plurality of VCIs executing on the first host and re-starting the plurality of the VCIs on a host other than the first host.

14 . The method of claim 8 , wherein the set of network addresses includes an address of at least an object specified for operation of the VCI or the first host, and wherein upon determining that the object is unreachable by the VCI or the first host, initiating remediation.

15 . One or more non-transitory computer storage media having computer-executable instructions that, upon execution by a processor, cause the processor to at least perform operations comprising:
evaluating a networking health status associated with a first host executing the VCI, the evaluating comprising:
pinging a set of network addresses from a virtual network interface available to the first host, and
pinging the set of network addresses from the VCI;
defining the networking health status based on the evaluation, the defining comprises identifying which of the set of network addresses are reachable; and initiating remediation for the first host based on the defined networking health status.

16 . The one or more non-transitory computer storage media of claim 15 , wherein evaluating the networking a health status of the first host further comprises determining health status of a management networking route for communication between the first host and a datacenter virtualization infrastructure.

17 . The one or more non-transitory computer storage media of claim 15 , wherein evaluating the networking a health status of the first host further comprises determining health status of a kernel networking route for communication between the first host and a datastore.

18 . The one or more non-transitory computer storage media of claim 17 , wherein the kernel networking route further comprises one or more of the following: a fault tolerance (FT) logging route, a virtual storage attached network (vSAN) route, and a network route used for VCI migration.

19 . The one or more non-transitory computer storage media of claim 15 , wherein initiating the remediation is performed by a second host, and wherein the second host selects a third host based on a networking health status associated with the third host, and initiates migration of the VCI executing on the first host to the selected third host.

20 . The one or more non-transitory computer storage media of claim 15 , wherein the set of network addresses includes an address of at least an object specified for operation of the VCI or the first host, and wherein upon determining that the object is unreachable by the VCI or the first host, initiating remediation.

Assignees

• Vmware Inc

Inventors

• Desai Aalap
• Krishnan Manoj
• Cherukupalli Ravi
• Chandrasekaran Rahul
• Mahindrakar Prafulla

Classifications

• 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

• G06F9/4856

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

• H04L69/40

  for recovering from a failure of a protocol instance or entity, e.g. service redundancy protocols, protocol state redundancy or protocol service redirection (management of faults, events, alarms or notifications in data switching networks H04L41/06) · CPC title

• H04L41/0677

  Localisation of faults · CPC title

• G06F2009/45595

  Network integration; Enabling network access in virtual machine instances · CPC title