Desktop image management for hosted hypervisor environments

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9286102-B1
Application number	US-201414534115-A
Country	US
Kind code	B1
Filing date	Nov 5, 2014
Priority date	Nov 5, 2014
Publication date	Mar 15, 2016
Grant date	Mar 15, 2016

Abstract

A desktop image management system is described that can be used to efficiently manage desktops and desktop image data in hosted hypervisor environments. The efficiency of backing up data and otherwise managing desktops that are running on virtual machines in a hosted hypervisor environment can be improved by utilizing an image management client installed in the host operating system and individual drivers installed on each virtual machine running on the hosted hypervisor. The image management client may also simplify and improve the process of distributing software updates from the central server to target virtual machines running on the hosted hypervisor environment.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A computing device for managing desktop images in a hosted hypervisor environment, said system comprising:
a host operating system on the computing device;
a hosted hypervisor executing within the host operating system, the hosted hypervisor configured to manage one or more virtual machines, each virtual machine including a guest operating system, wherein each virtual machine is associated with a virtual disk;
an image management client executing within the host operating system, the image management client configured to monitor changes on the computing device and to periodically replicate the changes to a remote server over a network connection;
wherein each guest operating system on each virtual machine includes a driver configured to:
detect a modification of a file in the virtual disk of the virtual machine in which the driver is operating; and
provide file identification information of the file that was modified to the image management client operating within the host operating system to enable the image management client to replicate the modification of the file to the remote server;
wherein the image management client is configured to:
receive, from the driver, the information identifying the file that was modified in the virtual disk of the virtual machine;
read the file in the virtual disk via a virtual machine communication interface; and
replicate the modification of the file to the remote server;

wherein the image management client is configured to use the driver to capture a volume shadow service (VSS) snapshot of the virtual disk and scan the VSS snapshot of the virtual disk at a file level to read the file using the information identifying the file.

2. The computing device of claim 1 , wherein the driver is a filter driver configured to monitor input/output (I/O) traffic between the guest operating system and the virtual disk, detect changes to files in the virtual disk caused by the I/O traffic and send the file identification information to the image management client.

3. The computing device of claim 1 , wherein the image management client is configured to:
receive a request to restore the file on a first virtual disk of a first virtual machine;
determine whether the file is available on any other virtual disk of any other virtual machine on the computing device or on the host operating system of the computing device;
in response to determining that the file is available on a second virtual disk or on a host operating system, restore the file by reading the file from the second virtual disk or the host operating system; or
in response to determining that the file is unavailable on any other virtual disk or the host operating system, retrieve the file from the remote server over the network connection.

4. The computing device of claim 1 , wherein the image management client is configured to:
receive a request to install an application on a virtual machine managed by the hosted hypervisor;
processing a manifest received from the remote server to determine which files need to be downloaded from the remote server in order to obtain an application layer corresponding to the application;
download, from the remote server, the needed files to obtain the application layer corresponding to the application;
apply the application layer to a virtual disk of the virtual machine; and
start the virtual machine.

5. The computing device of claim 1 , wherein each of the one or more application layers includes a set of files and a set of registry entries to be copied to the new virtual machine in order to install an application on the new virtual machine.

6. A method for managing desktop images in a hosted hypervisor environment, said method comprising:
executing a host operating system on the computing device;
executing a hosted hypervisor within the host operating system, the hosted hypervisor configured to manage one or more virtual machines, each virtual machine including a guest operating system, wherein each virtual machine is associated with a virtual disk; and
deploying an image management client executing within the host operating system, the image management client configured to monitor changes on the computing device and to periodically replicate the changes to a remote server over a network connection;
wherein each guest operating system on each virtual machine includes a driver configured to:
detect a modification of a file in the virtual disk of the virtual machine in which the driver is operating; and
provide file identification information of the file that was modified to the image management client operating within the host operating system to enable the image management client to replicate the modification of the file to the remote server;
wherein the image management client is configured to:
receive, from the driver, the information identifying the file that was modified in the virtual disk of the virtual machine;
read the file in the virtual disk via a virtual machine communication interface; and
replicate the modification of the file to the remote server;

wherein the image management client is configured to use the driver to capture a volume shadow service (VSS) snapshot of the virtual disk and scan the VSS snapshot of the virtual disk at a file level to read the file using the information identifying the file.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein the driver is a filter driver configured to monitor input/output (I/O) traffic between the guest operating system and the virtual disk, detect changes to files in the virtual disk caused by the I/O traffic and send the file identification information to the image management client.

8. The method of claim 6 , wherein the image management client is configured to:
receive a request to restore the file on a first virtual disk of a first virtual machine;
determine whether the file is available on any other virtual disk of any other virtual machine on the computing device or on the host operating system of the computing device;
in response to determining that the file is available on a second virtual disk or on a host operating system, restore the file by reading the file from the second virtual disk or the host operating system; or
in response to determining that the file is unavailable on any other virtual disk or the host operating system, retrieve the file from the remote server over the network connection.

9. The method of claim 6 , wherein the image management client is configured to:
receive a request to install an application on a virtual machine managed by the hosted hypervisor;
processing a manifest received from the remote server to determine which files need to be downloaded from the remote server in order to obtain an application layer corresponding to the application;
download, from the remote server, the needed files to obtain the application layer corresponding to the application;
apply the application layer to a virtual disk of the virtual machine; and
start the virtual machine.

10. The method of claim 6 , wherein each of the one or more application layers includes a set of files and a set of registry entries to be copied to the new virtual machine in order to install an application on the new virtual machine.

11. A non-transitory computer readable storage medium comprising one or more sequences of instructions, the instructions when executed by one or more processors causing the one or more processors to execute the operations of:
executing a host operating system on the computing device;
executing a hosted hypervisor within the host operating system, the hosted hypervisor configured to manage one or more virtual machines, each virtual machine in

Assignees

• Vmware Inc

Inventors

• Harel Boaz
• Weinberg Yaniv

Classifications

• G06F2201/815

  Virtual · CPC title

• G06F2009/45591

  Monitoring or debugging support · CPC title

• G06F9/45558 Primary

  Hypervisor-specific management and integration aspects · CPC title

• G06F11/1451

  by selection of backup contents · CPC title

• G06F9/45545 Primary

  Guest-host, i.e. hypervisor is an application program itself, e.g. VirtualBox · CPC title