Hot recovery of virtual machines

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9760448-B1
Application number	US-201414320450-A
Country	US
Kind code	B1
Filing date	Jun 30, 2014
Priority date	Aug 23, 2013
Publication date	Sep 12, 2017
Grant date	Sep 12, 2017

Abstract

A method, computer program product, and computing system for hot recovery of virtual machines are described. The method may include initiating a recovery process to transfer data, from a backup archive of a virtual machine to be restored, to a virtual disk at the virtual machine host computer. The method may further include booting the virtual machine to be restored. The method may also include intercepting a read request from the virtual machine to the virtual disk at the virtual machine host computer. The method may additionally include determining if the read request from the virtual machine requested data from the virtual disk which has not yet been restored from the backup archive to the virtual disk by the recovery process. Moreover, the method may include, in response to determining that the requested data has not been restored from the backup archive to the virtual disk, returning the requested data.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method for hot recovery of virtual machines comprising:
initiating, with a virtual machine host computer, a recovery process to transfer data, from a backup archive of a virtual machine to be restored, to a virtual disk at the virtual machine host computer;
booting, from the virtual disk, the virtual machine to be restored;
intercepting a read request from the virtual machine to the virtual disk, wherein the read request is intercepted using a virtual machine communication interface socket;
determining, with the virtual machine host computer, if the read request from the virtual machine requested data from the virtual disk which has not yet been restored from the backup archive to the virtual disk by the recovery process; and
in response to determining that the requested data has not yet been restored from the backup archive to the virtual disk, returning the requested data from the backup archive to the virtual disk.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
intercepting a write request from the virtual machine to the virtual disk, wherein the write request is directed to an area of the virtual disk which has not yet been restored from the backup archive; and
writing data corresponding to the write request to the area of the virtual disk which has not yet been restored from the backup archive.

3. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
determining, with a file system driver, a range of sectors of the virtual disk that needs to be restored from the backup archive to restore the virtual machine in response to the read request, the read request comprising the range of sectors, wherein the range of sectors is determined by comparing checksums of sectors from the backup archive with checksums of sectors of the virtual disk.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the read request from the virtual machine to the virtual disk is intercepted by a disk drive level filter.

5. The method of claim 3 , wherein the file system driver is a virtual small computer system interface filter.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the requested data is restored from the backup archive to the virtual disk by an agent.

7. A computer program product residing on a non-transitory computer readable storage medium having a plurality of instructions stored thereon, which, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to perform operations for hot recovery of virtual machines, the operations comprising:
initiating, with a virtual machine host computer, a recovery process to transfer data, from a backup archive of a virtual machine to be restored, to a virtual disk at the virtual machine host computer;
booting, from the virtual disk, the virtual machine to be restored;
intercepting a read request from the virtual machine to the virtual disk;
determining, with the virtual machine host computer, if the read request from the virtual machine requested data from the virtual disk which has not yet been restored from the backup archive to the virtual disk by the recovery process; and
in response to determining that the requested data has not yet been restored from the backup archive to the virtual disk, returning the requested data from the backup archive to the virtual disk, wherein the requested data is returned to the virtual disk using a virtual machine communication interface socket.

8. The computer program product of claim 7 , wherein the operations further comprise:
intercepting a write request from the virtual machine to the virtual disk, wherein the write request is directed to an area of the virtual disk which has not yet been restored from the backup archive; and
writing data corresponding to the write request to the area of the virtual disk which has not yet been restored from the backup archive.

9. The computer program product of claim 7 , wherein the operations further comprise:
determining, with a file system driver, a range of sectors of the virtual disk that needs to be restored from the backup archive to restore the virtual machine in response to the read request, the read request comprising the range of sectors, wherein the range of sectors is determined by comparing checksums of sectors from the backup archive with checksums of sectors of the virtual disk.

10. The computer program product of claim 7 , wherein the read request from the virtual machine to the virtual disk is intercepted by a disk drive level filter.

11. The computer program product of claim 10 , wherein the file system driver is a virtual small computer system interface filter.

12. The computer program product of claim 7 , wherein the requested data is restored from the backup archive to the virtual disk by an agent.

13. A computing system for hot recovery of virtual machines, the computing system comprising one or more processors, wherein the one or more processors are configured to:
initiate, with a virtual machine host computer, a recovery process to transfer data, from a backup archive of a virtual machine to be restored, to a virtual disk at the virtual machine host computer;
boot, from the virtual disk, the virtual machine to be restored;
intercept a read request from the virtual machine to the virtual disk, wherein the read request is intercepted using a virtual machine communication interface socket;
determine, with the virtual machine host computer, if the read request from the virtual machine requested data from the virtual disk which has not yet been restored from the backup archive to the virtual disk by the recovery process; and
in response to determining that the requested data has not yet been restored from the backup archive to the virtual disk, return the requested data from the backup archive to the virtual disk, wherein the requested data is returned to the virtual disk using a virtual machine communication interface socket.

14. The computing system of claim 13 , wherein the one or more processors are further configured to:
intercept a write request from the virtual machine to the virtual disk, wherein the write request is directed to an area of the virtual disk which has not yet been restored from the backup archive; and
write data corresponding to the write request to the area of the virtual disk which has not yet been restored from the backup archive.

15. The computing system of claim 13 , wherein the one or more processors are further configured to:
determine, with a file system driver, a range of sectors of the virtual disk that needs to be restored from the backup archive to restore the virtual machine in response to the read request, the read request comprising the range of sectors, wherein the range of sectors is determined by comparing checksums of sectors from the backup archive with checksums of sectors of the virtual disk.

16. The computing system of claim 13 , wherein the read request from the virtual machine to the virtual disk is intercepted by a disk drive level filter.

17. The computing system of claim 16 , wherein the file system driver is a virtual small computer system interface filter.

18. The computing system of claim 13 , wherein the requested data is restored from the backup archive to the virtual disk by an agent.

19. A method for recovery of a virtual machine while keeping the virtual machine online, the method comprising:
receiving a selection indicating that a backup archive of a virtual machine is to be restored to a virtual disk at a virtual machine host computer from a storage device, wherein the backup archive is one of a plurality of virtual machine backup archives at the storage d

Assignees

• Acronis Int Gmbh

Inventors

• Per Yuri
• Lyadvinsky Maxim V
• Beloussov Serguei M
• Egorov Dmitry
• Borodin Alexey
• Semyonov Vasily

Classifications

• G06F11/1451

  by selection of backup contents · CPC title

• G06F11/1484

  involving virtual machines · CPC title

• G06F2201/815

  Virtual · CPC title

• G06F3/0619 Primary

  in relation to data integrity, e.g. data losses, bit errors · CPC title

• G06F11/0757

  by exceeding a time limit, i.e. time-out, e.g. watchdogs · CPC title