System and Method for Managing Size of Clusters in a Computing Environment

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2022129299-A1
Application number	US-202217647689-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Jan 11, 2022
Priority date	Dec 2, 2016
Publication date	Apr 28, 2022
Grant date	—

Abstract

A number of hosts in a logical cluster is adjusted up or down in an elastic manner by tracking membership of hosts in the cluster using a first data structure and tracking membership of hosts in a spare pool using a second data structure, and upon determining that a triggering condition for adding another host is met and that all hosts in the cluster are being used, selecting a host from the spare pool, and programmatically adding an identifier of the selected host to the first data structure and programmatically deleting the identifier of the selected host from the second data structure.

First claim

We claim:

1 . In a data center comprising a cluster of hosts, a spare host pool, and a failed host pool, a method of adjusting the number of hosts in the cluster, comprising:
tracking membership of hosts in the cluster; tracking membership of hosts in the spare host pool; determining that the cluster does not include a sufficient number of hosts based on an analysis of available resources to a plurality of virtual machines (VMs) in the cluster, the available resources comprising at least one of CPU resources, memory resources, or storage resources; selecting a second host from the spare host pool; migrating at least one of the VMs from the first host to the second host; updating membership of hosts in the cluster to include the second host; and updating membership of spare host pool hosts to remove the second host.

2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein determining that the cluster does not include a sufficient number of hosts is based on determining the existence of a partial or total failure of the first host in the cluster.

3 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the VM is migrated from the first host to the second host upon a failure of the first host.

4 . The method of claim 1 , wherein determining that the cluster does not include a sufficient number of hosts is based on utilization data associated with hosts in the cluster.

5 . The method of claim 4 , wherein the utilization data comprises a CPU utilization of hosts in the cluster, memory utilization of hosts in the cluster, or storage utilization of hosts in the cluster.

6 . The method of claim 5 , wherein determining that the cluster does not include a sufficient number of hosts further comprises determining that at least one of CPU utilization, memory utilization, or storage utilization exceeds a respective threshold.

7 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
determining that the utilization data indicates that the cluster is underutilized based on the analysis of available resources to a plurality of virtual machines (VMs) in the cluster; selecting a third host from the cluster; migrating at least one of the VMs from the third host to the first host or the second host; and updating membership of hosts in the cluster to remove the third host.

8 . A non-transitory computer-readable medium comprising instructions that are executable in a computing device to cause the computing device to at least:
track membership of hosts in the cluster; track membership of hosts in the spare host pool; determine that the cluster does not include a sufficient number of hosts based on an analysis of available resources to a plurality of virtual machines (VMs) in the cluster, the available resources comprising at least one of CPU resources, memory resources, or storage resources; select a second host from the spare host pool; migrate at least one of the VMs from the first host to the second host; update membership of hosts in the cluster to include the second host; and update membership of spare host pool hosts to remove the second host.

9 . The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 8 , wherein the instructions cause the computing device to determine that the cluster does not include a sufficient number of hosts based on determining the existence of a partial or total failure of the first host in the cluster.

10 . The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 8 , wherein the VM is migrated from the first host to the second host upon a failure of the first host.

11 . The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 8 , wherein the instructions cause the computing device to determine that the cluster does not include a sufficient number of hosts is based on utilization data associated with hosts in the cluster.

12 . The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 11 , wherein the utilization data comprises a CPU utilization of hosts in the cluster, memory utilization of hosts in the cluster, or storage utilization of hosts in the cluster.

13 . The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 12 , wherein the instructions cause the computing device to determine that the cluster does not include a sufficient number of hosts further comprises determining that at least one of CPU utilization, memory utilization, or storage utilization exceeds a respective threshold.

14 . The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 8 , wherein the instructions further cause the computing device to at least:
determine that the utilization data indicates that the cluster is underutilized based on the analysis of available resources to a plurality of virtual machines (VMs) in the cluster; select a third host from the cluster; migrate at least one of the VMs from the third host to the first host or the second host; and update membership of hosts in the cluster to remove the third host.

15 . A system comprising:
a cluster of hosts; a management server configured to at least:
track membership of hosts in the cluster;
track membership of hosts in the spare host pool;
determine that the cluster does not include a sufficient number of hosts based on an analysis of available resources to a plurality of virtual machines (VMs) in the cluster, the available resources comprising at least one of CPU resources, memory resources, or storage resources;
select a second host from the spare host pool;
migrate at least one of the VMs from the first host to the second host;
update membership of hosts in the cluster to include the second host; and
update membership of spare host pool hosts to remove the second host.

16 . The system of claim 15 , wherein the management server determines that the cluster does not include a sufficient number of hosts based on determining the existence of a partial or total failure of the first host in the cluster.

17 . The system of claim 15 , wherein the VM is migrated from the first host to the second host upon a failure of the first host.

18 . The system of claim 15 , wherein the management server determines that the cluster does not include a sufficient number of hosts is based on utilization data associated with hosts in the cluster.

19 . The system of claim 18 , wherein the utilization data comprises a CPU utilization of hosts in the cluster, memory utilization of hosts in the cluster, or storage utilization of hosts in the cluster.

20 . The system of claim 19 , wherein the management server determines that the cluster does not include a sufficient number of hosts further comprises determining that at least one of CPU utilization, memory utilization, or storage utilization exceeds a respective threshold.

21 . The system of claim 15 , wherein the management server is further configured to at least:
determine that the utilization data indicates that the cluster is underutilized based on the analysis of available resources to a plurality of virtual machines (VMs) in the cluster; select a third host from the cluster; migrate at least one of the VMs from the third host to the first host or the second host; and update membership of hosts in the cluster to remove the third host.

Assignees

• Vmware Inc

Inventors

• Krishnan Manoj
• Agarwal Anant
• Chandrasekaran Rahul
• Mahindrakar Prafulla
• Cherukupalli Ravi

Classifications

• G06F2009/4557

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

• G06F9/5061

  Partitioning or combining of resources · CPC title

• G06F2209/505

  Clust · 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

• G06F9/45558 Primary

  Hypervisor-specific management and integration aspects · CPC title