Abstract: A system includes network interface controller (NIC) and a host processor. The host processor may run a hypervisor or OS which may manage virtual network activity for virtual machines (VMs) and/or applications. The NIC may provide a physical function to the hypervisor to support network activity by the VMs and/or applications. Some VMs and/or applications on the network may bypass the hypervisor and access virtual functions from the NIC. The NIC may execute a configurable flow analyzer (CFA), which may perform flow processing operations on the network traffic. The CFA may access flow configuration and management parameters maintained by the hypervisor to control implementation of the flow processing operations. Performing the flow processing operations on the traffic for the VMs and/or applications bypassing the hypervisor or OS may extend management by the hypervisor or OS to these VMs and/or applications.

Abstract: An example method is provided to maintain state information of a virtual machine in a virtualized computing environment through a self-triggered approach. The method may comprise detecting, by a first host from a cluster in the virtualized computing environment, that the first host is disconnected from a network connecting the first host to a distributed storage system accessible by the cluster. The method may also comprise suspending, by the first host, a virtual machine supported by the first host and storing state information associated with the virtual machine. The method may further comprise selecting a second host from the cluster and migrating the suspended virtual machine to the second host such that the suspended virtual machine is able to resume from suspension on the second host based on the stored state information.

Abstract: An apparatus in one embodiment comprises a processing platform configured to implement multi-layer infrastructure comprising compute, storage and network resources at a relatively low level of the multi-layer infrastructure, an application layer at a relatively high level of the multi-layer infrastructure, and one or more additional layers arranged between the relatively high level and the relatively low level. The processing platform is further configured to determine policies for respective different ones of the layers of the multi-layer infrastructure, the policy for a given one of the layers of the multi-layer infrastructure defining rules and requirements relating to that layer, to enforce the policies at the respective layers of the multi-layer infrastructure, and to monitor performance of an application executing in the multi-layer infrastructure. One or more configuration parameters of the multi-layer infrastructure are adjusted based at least in part on a result of the monitoring.

Abstract: According to an example, a computer creates an application entry in a microblog page, receives a triggering operation command associated with the application entry, generates, based on the triggering operation command, a floating layer at a predetermined position on the microblog page, receives application data at the floating layer, and runs an application in the floating layer based on the application data.

Abstract: Processing within a computing environment that supports pageable guests is facilitated. Processing is facilitated in many ways, including, but not limited to, associating guest and host state information with guest blocks of storage; maintaining the state information in control blocks in host memory; enabling the changing of states; and using the state information in management decisions. In one particular example, the guest state includes an indication of usefulness and importance of memory contents to the guest, and the host state reflects the ease of access to memory contents. The host and guest state information is used in managing memory of the host and/or guests.

Abstract: In a computer-implemented method for decreasing time to deploy a virtual machine hosted by pre-configured hyper-converged computing device for supporting a virtualization infrastructure, instructions are provided to display a single end-user license agreement (EULA) to enable execution of software on the pre-configured hyper-converged computing device upon acceptance of the single EULA. Acceptance of the single EULA by a user is received. In response to the acceptance of the single EULA, a first virtual machine is deployed in a virtualization infrastructure supported by the pre-configured hyper-converged computing device such that the first virtual machine is deployed in a first time frame rather than a longer second time frame that includes accepting a plurality of EULAs.

Abstract: According to one embodiment, a computer-implemented method includes obtaining, during a measurement period, a set of utilization metrics for a system; determining, whether the average number of outstanding system requests of the system lies between a current and an actual value of the maximum concurrency; in response to determining that the average number of outstanding system requests of the system does not lie between the current and actual values of the maximum concurrency, not adjusting the maximum concurrency value; in response to determining that the average number of outstanding system requests of the system does lie between the current and actual values of the maximum concurrency, assigning a value of the maximum concurrency to be the value of the average number of outstanding system requests; accessing a utilization function; solving the utilization function; and managing performance problems of the system indicated by solving the utilization function.

Abstract: An efficient facility for determining resource usage, such as a processor time used by tasks. The determination is performed on behalf of user applications that do not require a call to operating system services. The facility includes an instruction that determines elapsed time and reports it to the user as a single unit of operation.

Abstract: A method for scheduling a virtual machine monitor having a scheduler, a task characteristic evaluation unit, and a credit management unit is provided. The virtual machine monitor drives at least two domains. The method includes scheduling, by the scheduler, the at least two domains, if an I/O event of each of the at least two domains in which the scheduling is performed is delayed, evaluating, by the task characteristic evaluation unit, a characteristic of a task of the at least two domains based on at least one of a central processing unit (CPU) intensive degree and an input/output (I/O) intensive degree of the at least two domains, differentially determining, by the credit management unit, an amount of credit in which each of the at least two domains retains according to the characteristic of the task, and determining, by the scheduler, an application frequency of a boost mechanism applied to the at least two domains according to the amount of credit.

Abstract: A customer submits a request to a virtual computer system service to launch a virtual machine instance and to join this instance to a managed directory. The service may obtain, from the customer, a domain name and Internet Protocol addresses for the selected directory, which is then stored within a systems management server. When launched, the instance may initiate an agent, which may communicate with the systems management server to obtain the configuration information. The agent may use this configuration information to establish a communications channel with the managed directory and create a temporary set of computer credentials that may be used to verify that the customer is authorized to join the virtual machine instance to the managed directory. If the credentials are valid, the managed directory may generate a computer account within the managed directory, which may be used to join the virtual machine instance to the managed directory.

Abstract: A processing system includes a data processor, an input, an output, a memory, an operation parser, and a timer manager instance controller. The input receives create-timer-manager-instance (CTMI) commands identifying a number of timers supported by a timer manager instance. The output provides responses including a CTMI response associated with the CTMI command. The operation parser receives the CTMI command from the input. The timer manager instance controller receive a control input from the operation parser based upon the CTMI command, and in response, allocates a block of memory locations in the memory based on the number of timers and provides a CTMI response to the output to indicate that the CTMI response was executed by the timer manager instance controller.

Abstract: Embodiments of the invention enable dynamic level boosting of operations across virtualization layers to enable efficient nested virtualization. Embodiments of the invention execute a first virtual machine monitor (VMM) to virtualize system hardware. A nested virtualization environment is created by executing a plurality of upper level VMMs via virtual machines (VMs). These upper level VMMs are used to execute an upper level virtualization layer including an operating system (OS). During operation of the above described nested virtualization environment, a privileged instruction issued from an OS is trapped and emulated via the respective upper level VMM (i.e., the VMM that creates the VM for that OS). Embodiments of the invention enable the emulation of the privileged instruction via a lower level VMM. In some embodiments, the emulated instruction is executed via the first VMM with little to no involvement of any intermediate virtualization layers residing between the first and upper level VMMs.

Abstract: In an embodiment, a method is provided. The method includes managing user-level threads on a first instruction sequencer in response to executing user-level instructions on a second instruction sequencer that is under control of an application level program. A first user-level thread is run on the second instruction sequencer and contains one or more user level instructions. A first user level instruction has at least 1) a field that makes reference to one or more instruction sequencers or 2) implicitly references with a pointer to code that specifically addresses one or more instruction sequencers when the code is executed.

Abstract: Methods, apparatus, and articles of manufacture to virtualize performance counters are disclosed. An example method includes dividing performance events to be counted into a plurality of classes; assigning a first virtual performance counter of a virtual machine to a first performance event type in a first one of the classes; assigning a second virtual performance counter of the virtual machine to a second performance event type in a second one of the classes different from the first class; incrementing the first virtual performance counter in response to a first occurrence of the first performance event type during direct execution of guest instructions by the virtual machine; and not incrementing the first virtual performance counter in response to a second occurrence of the first performance event type during execution of emulated instructions by a hypervisor on behalf of the virtual machine.

Abstract: A hypervisor preferably provides VM (virtual machine) identification, priority and LUN/LBA range information to the HBA (host bus adapter) when a VM is created. Alternatively, the HBA can determine that a LUN/LBA range is new and request VM identity, priority and LUN/LBA range from the hypervisor. The HBA creates a table containing the VM identification, priority and LUN/LBA range. The HBA then detects operations directed to the LUN/LBA range and does a lookup to determine VM identification and priority. VM identification and priority are then mapped into a field in a frame using a unique identifier. The unique identifier can be placed using reserved bits on the existing Fiber Channel (FC) header or can use bits in an additional header, such as a modified IFR header or an optional device header. The VM identification aware HBAs register with the NS.

Abstract: A technique is described for managing processor (CPU) resources in a host having virtual machines (VMs) executed thereon. A target size of a VM is determined based on its demand and CPU entitlement. If the VM's current size exceeds the target size, the technique dynamically changes the size of a VM in the host by increasing or decreasing the number of virtual CPUs available to the VM. To “deactivate” virtual CPUs, a high-priority balloon thread is launched and pinned to one of the virtual CPUs targeted for deactivation, and the underlying hypervisor deschedules execution of the virtual CPU accordingly. To “activate” virtual CPUs, the number of virtual CPUs, the launched balloon thread may be killed.

Abstract: A computer receives an application and system configuration detailing program applications, operating systems, and when and/or on which system an application may hibernate and/or operate. The computer determines a baseline power consumption of each of the applications on each of the applicable systems and operates the applications on the most energy efficient system. The computer monitors and displays the energy consumption of each application and determines whether the applications capable of hibernation have been idle for a period of time. If so, the computer hibernates the application until the application is awoken. If the application is incapable of hibernation nor idle, the computer compares the consumption to the determined baseline consumption of an alternative system and, if the consumption is greater than the baseline consumption of an alternative system and the application is capable of operation on the alternative system, moves operation of the application to the more efficient system.

Abstract: A computer receives an application and system configuration detailing program applications, operating systems, and when and/or on which system an application may hibernate and/or operate. The computer determines a baseline power consumption of each of the applications on each of the applicable systems and operates the applications on the most energy efficient system. The computer monitors and displays the energy consumption of each application and determines whether the applications capable of hibernation have been idle for a period of time. If so, the computer hibernates the application until the application is awoken. If the application is incapable of hibernation nor idle, the computer compares the consumption to the determined baseline consumption of an alternative system and, if the consumption is greater than the baseline consumption of an alternative system and the application is capable of operation on the alternative system, moves operation of the application to the more efficient system.

Abstract: Provided are techniques for lock profiling tool to identify code bottlenecks. A lock spin duration for a lock is determined. It is determined that the lock spin duration is greater than a lock trace threshold. The lock spin duration is classified into a time duration bucket. It is determining whether the lock is found in a list of locks for the time duration bucket. In response to determining that the lock is found in the list of locks, a lock count for the lock is incremented by one. In response to determining that the lock is not found in the list of locks, an entry for the lock is added in the list of locks for the time duration bucket and the lock count for the lock is initialized to one. A total spin duration time for the lock is updated by the lock spin duration.

Abstract: A method, system, and program product for hypervisor controlled redundancy for Input/Output (I/O) paths using virtualized I/O adapters is provided. A hypervisor detects a virtual machine exceeding a pre-defined bandwidth threshold. The hypervisor searches a shared pool of free virtual functions (VF) for a free VF. If the shared pool of free VFs is not depleted, a free VF is allocated to the virtual machine (VM). If the shared pool of free VFs is depleted, the active VMs are examined for VF capacity that may be donated to the triggering VM.