Virtual load-balanced service object

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2021314388-A1
Application number	US-202016897640-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Jun 10, 2020
Priority date	Apr 1, 2020
Publication date	Oct 7, 2021
Grant date	—

Abstract

Some embodiments of the invention provide a method for deploying network elements for a set of machines in a set of one or more datacenters. The datacenter set is part of one availability zone in some embodiments. The method receives intent-based API (Application Programming Interface) requests, and parses these API requests to identify a set of network elements to connect and/or perform services for the set of machines. In some embodiments, the API is a hierarchical document that can specify multiple different compute and/or network elements at different levels of compute and/or network element hierarchy. The method performs automated processes to define a virtual private cloud (VPC) to connect the set of machines to a logical network that segregates the set of machines from other machines in the datacenter set. In some embodiments, the set of machines include virtual machines and containers, the VPC is defined with a supervisor cluster namespace, and the API requests are provided as YAML files.

First claim

We claim:

1 . A method of deploying a load balanced service performed by a set of machines in a set of one or more datacenters, the method comprising
receiving an intent-based API (Application Programming Interface) request that maps a set of layer-4 (L4) ports and a protocol to the set of machines that perform the service; allocating a VIP (virtual Internet Protocol) address for the load-balanced service; distributing a set of one or more load balancing rules to one or more load balancer, each distributed load balancing rule including (i) a match criteria set that comprises the VIP, the port set, and protocol and (ii) an action criteria set that comprises a set of one or more identifiers that identify the set of machines that perform the service.

2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the API specifies the service as a virtual service that is exposed along the L4 port set and protocol and that is performed by the set of machines.

3 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the API request maps the L4 port set and protocol to a dynamic group of machines that comprises the set of machines.

4 . The method of claim 3 , wherein the set of machines comprises a plurality of machines, and the identifier set in the action criteria comprises an identifier that identifies the dynamic group of machines, the load balancer set converting the identifier to a plurality of network addresses of the plurality of the machines.

5 . The method of claim 4 further comprising distributing to the load balancer set a definition of the dynamic group that comprises the dynamic group identifier and the plurality of network addresses.

6 . The method of claim 3 , wherein the set of machines comprises a plurality of machines, and the identifier set in the action criteria comprises an identifier that identifies the dynamic group of machines, the load balancer set converting the dynamic group identifier to a plurality of pairs of layers 3 and 4 network addresses, each pair comprising an IP address and a port address of one machine in the plurality of machines.

7 . The method of claim 6 further comprising distributing to the load balancer set a definition of the dynamic group that comprises the dynamic group identifier and the plurality of pairs of layers 3 and 4 network addresses.

8 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the identifier set in the action criteria comprises network addresses for a plurality of machines that are members of the set of machines.

9 . The method of claim 3 , wherein the group of endpoint machines is a dynamic group as machines are added and removed from the group without changing the dynamic group identifier by simply changing a definition that identifies the machines that are members of the group.

10 . A method of exposing a service provided by a set of machines in a set of one or more datacenters, the method comprising
receiving a Custom Resource Definition (CRD) that defines the virtual service as a resource in the datacenter; receiving an intent-based API (Application Programming Interface) request referring to the CRD and defining a virtual service provided by the set of machines, the API mapping a set of one or more ports to the set of machines; performing an automated process to parse the API request and process the CRD to deploy the virtual service in the datacenter set.

11 . The method of claim 10 , wherein performing the automated process comprises configuring a set of one or more load balancers to distribute the data messages across the set of machines.

12 . The method of claim 11 , wherein
the API further refers to a load balancing resource for providing a load balancing service for the virtual service, performing the automated process further comprises configuring the set of load balancers to implement the load balancing resource to provide the load balancing service.

13 . The method of claim 12 , wherein
the virtual service is performed by a network, the set of load balancers is deployed at the north/south edge of the network.

14 . The method of claim 11 , wherein performing the automated process further comprises
allocating a VIP (virtual Internet Protocol) address for the virtual service; creating a load balancing rule that includes (i) a match criteria set that comprises the VIP and the port set, and (ii) an action criteria set that comprises a set of one or more identifiers that identify the set of machines; providing the load balancing rule to the load balancer set.

15 . The method of claim 11 , wherein the API further defines the set of machines, which is to provide the virtual service, as an endpoint group that is a group of machines that has a dynamically adjustable set of members.

16 . The method of claim 15 , wherein the endpoint group comprises machines of different types, including virtual machines and containers.

17 . The method of claim 10 , wherein the API maps the port set to the machine set by mapping the port set and a protocol to the machine set.

18 . The method of claim 10 , wherein the set of machines are a set of workload machines, and the virtual service is one operation that is performed by each workload machine in the set of workload machines.

19 . The method of claim 10 , wherein the virtual service is a virtual middlebox service operation.

Assignees

• Vmware Inc

Inventors

• Zhou Zhengsheng
• Shen Jianjun
• Raut Abhishek
• Liu Yang

Classifications

• H04L41/0893

  Assignment of logical groups to network elements · 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

• H04L41/0894

  Policy-based network configuration management · CPC title

• H04L41/0895

  Configuration of virtualised networks or elements, e.g. virtualised network function or OpenFlow elements · CPC title

• H04L41/40

  using virtualisation of network functions or resources, e.g. SDN or NFV entities · CPC title