Modifying an OS installer to allow for hypervisor-specific adjustment of an OS

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9880868-B2
Application number	US-201113307935-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Nov 30, 2011
Priority date	Nov 30, 2011
Publication date	Jan 30, 2018
Grant date	Jan 30, 2018

Abstract

An installer installing an operating system on a host computer system detects that the operating system is to be run under a hypervisor, and causes at least one configuration parameter of the operating system to be adjusted based on the hypervisor. A migration tool migrating a virtual machine from one hypervisor to another hypervisor, identifies the types of the two hypervisors, the operating system used by the virtual machine, and causes at least one configuration parameter of the operating system to be adjusted based on the target hypervisor.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method comprising:
detecting that an operating system to be installed on a host computer is to be run under a hypervisor by identifying a type of virtual device being used by a virtual machine that is associated with the hypervisor;
providing a user interface comprising a plurality of options for a configuration parameter of the operating system in view of the hypervisor and before the operating system is installed on the host computer, wherein the plurality of options comprises a first option to adjust the configuration parameter of the operating system in view of the hypervisor to enhance the operating system with the hypervisor when interfacing with hardware of the host computer by having the operating system write data to a storage resource associated with the host computer without using a caching operation and a second option to adjust the configuration parameter of the operating system in view of the hardware of the host computer to enhance the operating system when interfacing with the hardware of the host computer by having the operating system write data to the storage resource associated with the host computer by using the caching operation;
identifying a policy associated with the host computer; and
adjusting, by a processing device, the configuration parameter of the operating system in view of the hypervisor, a selection of one of the first option or the second option for the configuration parameter from the user interface, and the policy associated with the host computer, wherein the adjusting of the configuration parameter changes how the operating system interfaces with the hardware of the host computer in view of the hypervisor.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the adjusting of the configuration parameter comprises:
providing the user interface facilitating user input as to whether the configuration parameter is to be changed;
receiving user input requesting that the configuration parameter be adjusted; and
setting the configuration parameter to a value corresponding to the hypervisor or suitable for one or more hypervisors.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein adjusting the configuration parameter comprises updating a configuration file using a value for the configuration parameter in view of the hypervisor.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein adjusting the configuration parameter comprises enabling, by an installer, a service to set the configuration parameter to a value in view of the hypervisor.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein adjusting the configuration parameter comprises setting, by an installer, the configuration parameter to a value in view of the hypervisor or a value acceptable for multiple hypervisors.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein detecting that the operating system is to be run under the hypervisor comprises:
detecting one or more virtual machine attributes.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein detecting that the operating system is to be run under the hypervisor comprises:
receiving a message from the hypervisor.

8. The method of claim 4 , wherein adjusting the configuration parameter further comprises starting the service.

9. An apparatus comprising:
a memory; and
a processing device, operatively coupled with the memory, to:
detect that an operating system to be installed on a host computer is to be run under a hypervisor by identifying a type of virtual device being used by a virtual machine that is associated with the hypervisor;
provide a user interface comprising a plurality of options for a configuration parameter of the operating system in view of the hypervisor from the user interface and before the operating system is installed on the host computer, wherein the plurality of options comprises a first option to adjust the configuration parameter of the operating system in view of the hypervisor to enhance the operating system with the hypervisor when interfacing with hardware of the host computer by having the operating system write data to a storage resource associated with the host computer without using a caching operation and a second option to adjust the configuration parameter of the operating system in view of hardware of the host computer to enhance the operating system when interfacing with the hardware of the host computer by having the operating system write data to the storage resource associated with the host computer by using the caching operation;
identify a policy associated with the host computer; and
adjust the configuration parameter of the operating system in view of the hypervisor, a selection of one of the first option or the second option for the configuration parameter, and the policy associated with the host computer, wherein the adjusting of the configuration parameter changes how the operating system interfaces with the hardware of the host computer in view of the identified type of the hypervisor.

10. The apparatus of claim 9 , wherein the processing device is further to:
identify a type of the hypervisor.

11. The apparatus of claim 9 , wherein to adjust the configuration parameter, the processing device is further to:
provide the user interface facilitating user input as to whether the configuration parameter is to be changed;
receive user input requesting that the configuration parameter be adjusted; and
set the configuration parameter to a value corresponding to the hypervisor or suitable for one or more hypervisors.

12. The apparatus of claim 9 , wherein to adjust the configuration parameter, the processing device is to perform one or more of:
updating a configuration file using a value for the configuration parameter in view of the identified type of the hypervisor;
enabling a service to set the configuration parameter to a value in view of the identified type of the hypervisor; or
setting the configuration parameter to a value in view of the identified type of the hypervisor or a value acceptable for multiple types of hypervisors.

13. The apparatus of claim 9 , wherein to detect that the operating system is to be run under the hypervisor, the processing device is further to perform one or more of:
detecting one or more virtual machine attributes; and
receiving a message from the hypervisor.

14. The apparatus of claim 12 , wherein to adjust the configuration parameter, the processing device is further to start the service.

15. A non-transitory machine-readable storage medium comprising instructions that, when executed by a processing device, cause the processing device to:
detect that an operating system to be installed on a host computer is to be run under a hypervisor by identifying a type of virtual device being used by a virtual machine that is associated with the hypervisor;
provide a user interface comprising a plurality of options for a configuration parameter of the operating system in view of the hypervisor and before the operating system is installed on the host computer, wherein the plurality of options comprises a first option to adjust the configuration parameter of the operating system in view of the hypervisor to enhance the operating system with the hypervisor when interfacing with hardware of the host computer by having the operating system write data to a storage resource associated with the host computer without using a caching operation and a second option to adjust the configuration parameter of the operating system in view of hardware of the host computer to enhance the operating system when interfacing with the hardware of the host computer by having the operating system write data to the storage resource associated with the host computer by using the caching operat

Assignees

• Shah Amit
• Red Hat Inc

Inventors

• Shah Amit

Classifications

• G06F9/45558 Primary

  Hypervisor-specific management and integration aspects · CPC title

• G06F2009/45562

  Creating, deleting, cloning virtual machine instances · CPC title