Abstract: A virtual machine monitor (VMM) is configured to enforce deterministic execution of virtual machines in a multiprocessor machine. The VMM is configured to ensure that any communication by physical processors via shared memory is deterministic. When such VMMs are implemented in a distributed environment of multiprocessor machines coupled via a logical communication link, non-deterministic server applications running on virtual machines using the VMM may be replicated.

Abstract: One embodiment of the present invention includes a memory management unit (MMU) that is configured to manage sparse mappings. The MMU processes requests to translate virtual addresses to physical addresses based on page table entries (PTEs) that indicate a sparse status. If the MMU determines that the PTE does not include a mapping from a virtual address to a physical address, then the MMU responds to the request based on the sparse status. If the sparse status is active, then the MMU determines the physical address based on whether the type of the request is a write operation and, subsequently, generates an acknowledgement of the request. By contrast, if the sparse status is not active, then the MMU generates a page fault. Advantageously, the disclosed embodiments enable the computer system to manage sparse mappings without incurring the performance degradation associated with both page faults and conventional software-based sparse mapping management.

Abstract: First and second machines execute a plurality of distributed processes. A storing unit stores therein progress information of a process executed by the first machine. A calculating unit transmits the progress information to the second machine upon receiving a reassignment instruction indicating reassignment of the process to the second machine. The calculating unit transmits data to be used in the process to the second machine together with the progress information upon receiving the data during the transmission of the progress information. Upon receiving the progress information and the data, the second machine executes the process reassigned from the first machine using the progress information and the data.

Abstract: In an approach for testing the operations of a host system during a host system migration, a terminal agent exchanges messages already exchanged between the current host system and a terminal with the new host system. A manual operation replay unit replays messages generated by manual operations among the messages sent to the current host system by the terminal. An automatic response unit automatically generates a response message for messages received from the new host system. The automatic response unit also generates screen data for a screen displayed on the terminal on the basis of messages received from the new host system. A comparison unit compares and evaluates screen data generated by the automatic response unit and screen data from a screen generated by the terminal on the basis of messages received from the current host system.

Abstract: Techniques are described for importing and using virtual machine images in configured manners, such as by a virtual machine image importation service on behalf of clients. An image may be retrieved based on a client-provided location, and various characteristics of the image may be identified via application of multiple heuristic or other assessment tests to various aspects of the retrieved image such as a master boot record, filesystem, or directory structure of the image to determine a testing vector that is compared to identification vectors associated with known operating systems, in order to automatically determine a specific operating system installed on the image to be imported. Modifications may be made to drivers, configuration and system files of the retrieved image based on the identified operating system and other image characteristics.

Abstract: Using stored information about the compilation environment during compilation of a code segment to improve performance of just-in-time compilers. A set of characteristic(s) of a compilation environment is measured during compilation of a code segment. Information that may be relevant to how the compilation is performed is derived from at least one of the measured characteristics and stored in a persistent storage device. Upon a subsequent request to compile that code segment, the information is retrieved and used to change compilation behavior. The set of characteristic(s) relate to at least either compilation backlog or peak memory usage. The changed compilation behavior involves at least adjusting the scheduling of the subsequent compilation request or adjusting the compiler optimization level.

Abstract: A processor includes a decode unit to decode a return target restrictive return from procedure (RTR return) instruction. A return target restriction unit is responsive to the RTR return instruction to determine whether to restrict an attempt by the RTR return instruction to make a control flow transfer to an instruction at a return address corresponding to the RTR return instruction. The determination is based on compatibility of a type of the instruction at the return address with the RTR return instruction and based on compatibility of first return target restrictive information (RTR information) of the RTR return instruction with second RTR information of the instruction at the return address. A control flow transfer unit is responsive to the RTR return instruction to transfer control flow to the instruction at the return address when the return target restriction unit determines not to restrict the attempt.

Abstract: In an environment in which a processor operates a hypervisor and multiple guest partitions operating under the hypervisor's control, it is desirable to allow a guest partition access to a physical memory device without decreasing system performance. Accordingly, a conversion instruction for converting a logical address to a real address, i.e., an LTOR instruction, executable from a guest partition, is added to the processor. Upon the guest partition's execution of the conversion instruction with the logical address specified, the processor converts the logical address to an encrypted real address, and returns it to the guest partition. The guest partition is then able to pass the encrypted real address to an accelerator that converts the encrypted real address to a real address in order to access the memory device using the real address.

Abstract: The present invention provides a method and a system for simulating multiple processors in parallel, and a scheduler. In this embodiment, the scheduler maps debug interface information of a to-be-simulated processor requiring debugging onto the scheduler during parallel simulation of multiple processors, so that the scheduler is capable of debugging, by using a master thread, the to-be-simulated processor requiring debugging via a debug interface of the to-be-simulated processor requiring debugging pointed by the debug interface information, thereby implementing debugging during parallel simulation of multiple processors.

Abstract: Execution-Aware Memory protection technologies are described. A processor includes a processor core and a memory protection unit (MPU). The MPU includes a memory protection table and memory protection logic. The memory protection table defines a first protection region in main memory, the first protection region including a first instruction region and a first data region. The memory protection logic determines a protection violation by a first instruction when 1) an instruction address, resulting from an instruction fetch operation corresponding to the first instruction, is not within the first instruction region or 2) a data address, resulting from an execute operation corresponding to the first instruction, is not within the first data region.

Abstract: An apparatus includes a memory configured to hold a condition for determining whether or not to migrate a virtual machine that runs on a certain information processing apparatus included in a plurality of information processing apparatuses, to other information processing apparatus included in the plurality of information processing apparatuses, and a processor coupled to the memory and configured to when the condition is satisfied in a first information processing apparatus included in the plurality of information processing apparatuses, migrate a first virtual machine that runs on the first information processing apparatus to another information processing apparatus included in the plurality of information processing apparatuses, after migrating the first virtual machine, detect a status of an error occurring in the first information processing apparatus, and change the condition, based on the detected status of the error.

Abstract: Systems, methods, apparatuses, and software for data storage systems are provided herein. In one example, a data storage assembly is provided. The data storage assembly includes a plurality of storage drives each comprising a PCIe host interface and solid state storage media, with each of the storage drives configured to store and retrieve data responsive to storage operations received over an associated PCIe host interface. The data storage assembly includes a PCIe switch circuit coupled to the PCIe host interfaces of the storage drives and configured to receive the storage operations issued by one or more host systems over a shared PCIe interface and transfer the storage operations for delivery to the storage drives over selected ones of the PCIe host interfaces. The data storage assembly includes holdup circuitry configured to provide power to at least the storage drives after input power is lost to the data storage assembly.

Abstract: A host computing device can include a host domain that includes an agent for configuring the operation and/or functionality of virtual machine instances and/or operating systems associated with the instances, which may be heterogeneous (i.e., running different operating systems than each other). One or more data volumes associated with the host machine can include an image of an operating system. In an embodiment the agent can access the image of the operating system and configure operating system settings, add data, and/or remove data.

Abstract: Systems and methods for reducing redundant network transmissions in virtual machine live migration.

Abstract: A method and an apparatus for activity based execution scheduling are described. Activities may be tracked among a plurality of threads belonging to a plurality of processes running in one or more processors. Each thread may be associated with one of the activities. Each activity may be associated with one or more of the threads in one or more of the processes for a data processing task. The activities may be ordered by a priority order. A group of the threads may be identified to be associated with a particular one of the activities with highest priority based on the priority order. A thread may be selected from the identified threads for next scheduled execution in the processors.

Abstract: Provided is a method of preserving object code translations of a library for future reuse by an emulator. A munmap(2) system call is intercepted from an application for unmapping a mapped library memory address. A determination is made if an entry related to the mapped library memory address is present in a first predefined data structure. If said entry is present, a determination is made if the mapped library memory address corresponds to a library text or library data. If the mapped memory address corresponds to the library text, said entry is flagged as inactive in the first predefined data structure, and an object code translation of the library text is preserved in the mapped library memory address. If the mapped library memory address corresponds to the library data, contents of the mapped address are reset to zero.

Abstract: A virtual machine deployment and management engine deploys virtual machines to physical host computers based on a deployment time matrix. The deployment time matrix specifies approximate amounts of time used to clone or deploy a virtual machine from every host computer to every other host computer. The virtual machine deployment and management engine selects a deployment path based on the deployment times and executes the clone or deploy operations.

Abstract: Embodiments are provided herein for increasing low density signature space for multiplexed transmissions for a plurality of users. The embodiments include generating a virtual signature using a combination operation on a plurality of basic signatures. The generated virtual signatures are provisioned as basic resource units (BRUs) for transmissions for corresponding users. The combination operation is a row-wise or column-wise permutation for combining, in each of the virtual signatures, rows or columns of corresponding basic signatures. The rows or columns represent sequences of frequency bands at one time interval or sequences of allocated time intervals at one frequency band. Alternatively, the combination operation is intra-basic resource unit (BRU) hopping. The embodiments also include generating a plurality of BRU sets comprised of virtual signatures. Each of the BRU sets is provisioned for a corresponding user.

Abstract: During a process of migrating a source system into a standardized virtual environment, virtual machine instances of the source system executing in a hypervisor are snapshotted as virtual machine images in an operational repository of the hypervisor. The virtual machine images in the operational repository are short-term snapshots. From time to time during the migration process, long-term snapshots of the source system are created by checking given ones of the virtual machine images from the hypervisor operational repository into an image library as image objects.

Abstract: Embodiments described herein rapidly migrate child virtual machines (VM) by leveraging shared memory resources between parent and child VMs. In a first, proactive phase, parent VMs are migrated to a plurality of potential target hosts. In a second, reactive phase, after a request is received to migrate a child VM to a selected target host, memory blocks that are unique to the child VM are migrated to the selected target host. In some examples, memory blocks are compressed and decompressed as needed. In other examples, the operation environment is modified. Aspects of the disclosure offer a high performance, resource efficient solution that outperforms traditional approaches in areas of software compatibility, stability, quality of service control, resource utilization, and more.

Abstract: In one embodiment, a virtual machine manager may use dynamic memory balancing and greedy ballooning to improve guest memory performance. A memory 130 may have a system memory page set with a system memory page set size associated with the virtual machine to support a guest memory page set of the virtual machine with a guest memory page set size. A processor 120 may instruct the virtual machine to execute a reduction of the guest memory page set size. The processor 120 may maintain the system memory page set size during the reduction.

Abstract: In a method for managing memory pages, responsive to determining that a server is experiencing memory pressure, one or more processors identifying a first memory page in a listing of memory pages in the server. The method further includes determining whether the first memory page corresponds to a logical partition (LPAR) of the server that is scheduled to undergo an operation to migrate data stored on memory pages of the LPAR to another server. The method further includes, responsive to determining that the first memory page does correspond to a LPAR of the server that is scheduled to undergo an operation to migrate data, determining whether to evict the first memory page based on a memory page state associated with the first memory page. The method further includes, responsive to determining to evict the first memory page, evicting data stored in the first memory page to a paging space.

Abstract: A virtual machine cache provides for maintaining a working set of the cache during a transfer between virtual machine hosts. In response to the transfer, a previous host retains cache data of the virtual machine, which is provided to the new host of the virtual machine. The cache data may be transferred via a network transfer.

Abstract: Embodiments of the inventive concept can include a multi-stage mapping technique for a page cache controller. For example, a gigantic virtual page address space can be mapped to a physical page address efficiently, both in terms of time and space. An internal mapping module can implement a mapping technique for kernel virtual page address caching. In some embodiments, the mapping module can include integrated balanced skip lists and page tables for mapping sparsely populated kernel virtual page address space or spaces to physical block (i.e., page) address space or spaces. The mapping module can automatically and dynamically convert one or more sections from a skip list to a page table, or from a page table to a skip list. Thus, the kernel page cache can be extended to have larger secondary memory using volatile or non-volatile page cache storage media.

Abstract: According to one example, a method includes with a hypervisor, detecting that a guest has executed a memory monitor command for a virtual processor, making a copy of a memory address associated with the memory monitor command, the copy being placed in hypervisor memory, and with the hypervisor, in response to detecting that the guest system has executed a wait command, executing a loop until the copy is different than the data stored in the memory address.

Abstract: An apparatus includes a primary hypervisor that is executable on a first set of processors and a secondary hypervisor that is executable on a second set of processors. The primary hypervisor may define settings of a resource and the secondary hypervisor may use the resource based on the settings defined by the primary hypervisor. For example, the primary hypervisor may program memory address translation mappings for the secondary hypervisor. The primary hypervisor and the secondary hypervisor may include their own schedulers.

Abstract: A translation system can translate a request having multiple fields to a physical address using the fields as indexes to a multi-dimensional graph. A field or portion of a field can represent a location along an axis. When combined together, the fields can represent a point in n-space, where n is the number of axes. In some embodiments, a nearest neighbor calculation can be sufficient along an axis. Therefore, a point in n-space defined by the fields can be translated along an axis until a nearest neighbor entry is determined. When the entry is determined, the entry can be accessed to determine a correct response to the translation request.

Abstract: Solid-state storage devices may be employed to store data maintained by a database management system, but may have characteristics that reduce the efficiency of interactions between the database management system and the device. A storage subsystem may receive information indicative of internal boundaries within database data. A segment of the database data may be selected for compression, wherein the size of the segment is based at least on one or more the internal boundaries, the memory page size of the solid-state drive, and a predicted rate of compression. The compressed segment may be stored if it has a size less than the memory page size of the device. If it does not, compression may be retried with a smaller segment of data or a portion of the data may be stored in uncompressed form. Additional segments of the data may be stored on the solid-state drive in a similar manner.

Abstract: Methods and apparatuses for remote application provisioning over a virtual machine are described. A request to move an application from a source is received. In response to the request, a target virtual machine for the application is created. The application is moved to the target virtual machine. For an embodiment, the application image is moved and well defined automation is performed to launch the application. For an embodiment, the application is loaded over the template virtual machine, which is available in a target hypervisor.

Abstract: Embodiments of an invention for virtualization exceptions are disclosed. In one embodiment, a processor includes instruction hardware, control logic, and execution hardware. The instruction hardware is to receive a plurality of instructions, including an instruction to enter a virtual machine. The control logic is to determine, in response to a privileged event occurring within the virtual machine, whether to generate a virtualization exception. The execution hardware is to generate a virtualization exception in response to the control logic determining to generate a virtualization exception.

Abstract: In one aspect, a method includes providing virtual volumes (VVols) and mappings from the VVols to corresponding data storage devices to an I/O filter in a first virtual machine (VM), sending control path commands sent from the first VM to a control-path manager VM, the first VM and the control-path manager VM being run on a VM host, intercepting an I/O for a VVol using the I/O filter and sending the intercepted I/O to a data storage device mapped to the VVol.

Abstract: A system and method for analyzing application execution of multi-threaded applications is disclosed. An exemplary system includes a portable inter-thread communication mechanism; a profiling module; and an external interpretation application. A communication mechanism may be used to implement communication among a plurality of application threads. Responsive to an indication that an application should be monitored, a profiling module may profile at least one of a plurality of application threads to monitor and measure the thread's communications. Profiling information may be logged and the log may be provided to the external interpretation application. The external interpretation application may then parse the log and produce a graphic representation of execution metrics based on the information parsed from the log. The graphic representation may allow an end-user to acquire information and determine several statistics regarding the application's execution.

Abstract: Systems and methods are disclosed which facilitate monitoring of usage information associated with services implemented within a hosted computing environment. Providers of a service, or other authorized parties, may be enabled to associate one or more descriptors with a service. Thereafter, each service instances may be monitored for such descriptors. By correlating usage information of instances with specific descriptors, usage information for the descriptor may be generated. In some instances, usage information corresponding to a descriptor may be utilized to monitor license agreements associated with services including the descriptor. Further, use of descriptors may reduce or eliminate the need to associate services with physical attributes of hosting computing devices, such as media access control addresses.

Abstract: Mechanisms are provided for automatically expanding a virtual storage of a virtual machine. The virtual machine monitors a usage of the virtual storage of the virtual machine. The virtual machine determines, based on the monitoring of the usage of the virtual storage, whether to expand the virtual storage of the virtual machine. In response to the virtual machine determining to expand the virtual storage of the virtual machine, a virtual machine manager executes one or more operations to expand the virtual storage. The monitoring and determining may be performed by a virtual storage management agent executing within the virtual machine and which may send an expansion request to an authorization engine to request expansion of the virtual storage.

Abstract: Generally described, aspects of the present disclosure relate to offload device virtual component checkpointing for fast recovery from virtual component software crashes by storing virtual component state configuration information and input/output (I/O) request identification information in non-volatile memory of a physical computing device physically separate from the offload device. In the event of a software crash of a virtual component, the crashed virtual component may be rebooted and reconfigured in accordance with the virtual component state configuration information and I/O request identification information stored in the non-volatile memory of the physical computing device.

Abstract: A system for data storage includes multiple servers, which are configured to communicate over a network with multiple multi-queue storage devices and with at least one storage controller, to store on the storage devices compressed data belonging to a user volume, to specify storage locations, in which the compressed data is stored on the storage devices, in a shared data structure that is shared and modified by the servers using remote direct memory access, and to coordinate access to the compressed data by the servers by querying the shared data structure, without executing code on a processor of the storage controller.

Abstract: A device may receive a virtual image of a first state of a first virtual machine. Session information of the state of the first virtual machine may be synchronized with a second state of a second virtual machine. The second state of the second virtual machine may become active when the first virtual machine becomes unavailable. The device may identify that the first virtual machine is unavailable; and output, based on the identifying, the virtual image of the first state to a particular third virtual machine, to cause the particular third virtual machine to restore the first state of the first virtual machine. The second state of the second virtual machine may become inactive when the first state is restored to the third virtual machine.

Abstract: A method and system for location of memory management translations in an emulated processor. The method includes: detecting a page miss of a process on an emulated processor, wherein the emulated processor software refills a translation lookaside buffer (TLB); locating a secondary data structure in memory; fetching a missing translation from a secondary data structure in memory; and inserting the missing translation in a guest translation lookaside buffer; wherein the steps are carried out in a trap handler in the emulated environment. The steps may be carried out in the emulated processor or in a host server of the emulated processor instead of invoking a guest operating system trap handler.

Abstract: One or more techniques and/or systems are provided for remotely and/or automatically managing a monitoring pool of management servers configured to monitor resources, such as storage devices. For example, a monitoring installer package may be sent from a remote source to a management server for remote installation of a monitoring component capable of monitoring resources. The monitoring installer package may be remotely executed from the remote source to install the monitoring component on the management server. The management server may be assigned to the monitoring pool, and may be configured to monitor, utilizing the monitoring component, a set of resources of a resource pool. In this way, management servers may be remotely added to and/or removed from the monitoring pool. Load balancing may be remotely performed for the management servers assigned to the monitoring pool.

Abstract: A first computer starts to copy data of a virtual machine running on the first computer from the first computer to a second computer. The first computer monitors an index value related to conditions of running the virtual machine on the second computer. The first computer causes, based on the index value, the second computer to start operation of the virtual machine based on the data copied from the first computer to the second computer and terminating operation of the virtual machine running on the first computer.

Abstract: Functionality is disclosed herein for providing an asynchronous processing service for processing storage mapping information. The asynchronous processing service is configured to receive a storage request including identification of a storage object and a description of a storage operation, perform the storage operation for the storage object in response to receiving the storage request, and asynchronously update mapping information for the performed storage operation.

Abstract: A method for oversubscribing a host memory of a host running a virtual machine monitor (VMM), comprising, examining a virtual machine (VM) memory for a VM for metadata associated with the VM memory, the metadata maintained by a guest OS running on the VM, collecting the metadata for the VM memory, and managing the VM memory using the metadata for oversubscribing a host memory.

Abstract: An Internet of Things system and method are described. For example, one embodiment of a system comprises: an IoT hub comprising a WAN interface to couple the IoT hub to an IoT service over the WAN, and a local communication interface to communicatively couple the IoT hub to a plurality of different types of IoT devices; and at least one IoT device having a memory for storing program code and a microcontroller for executing the program code, wherein the program code includes library program code comprising basic building blocks usable by a developer to implement any IoT device by creating application program code which utilizes the library program code, wherein at least one of the basic building blocks comprises a communication stack to enable communication with the IoT hub, the library program code provided to the developer in a software development kit (SDK) with the microcontroller.

Abstract: Exemplary methods, apparatuses, and systems receive a request to initiate replication of a virtual machine (VM). In response to the request, a copy of the VM disk is exported to a locally attached portable storage device while the VM continues running. In response to receiving indication of the VM disk being imported from the portable storage device locally within a destination data center, the host computer determines VM data within the source data center is different from or not included within the exported copy of the VM disk and transmits the VM data to the destination data center via a network connection while the VM continues running. An indication that the virtual machine data within the destination data center is within a threshold of similarity with virtual machine data within the source data center is transmitted to the destination data center via the network connection.

Abstract: Techniques are disclosed for orchestrating high availability (HA) failover for virtual machines (VMs) running on host systems of a host cluster, where the host cluster aggregates locally-attached storage resources of the host systems to provide an object store, and where persistent data for one or more of the VMs is stored as per-VM storage objects across the locally-attached storage resources comprising the object store. In one embodiment, a host system in the host cluster executing a HA module determines a VM to be restarted on an active host system in the host cluster. The host system further determines if the VM's persistent data is stored in the object store. If so, the host system adds the VM to a list of VMs to be immediately restarted. Otherwise, the host system checks whether the VM is accessible to the host system by querying a storage layer of the host system configured to manage the object store.

Abstract: A cross-host multi-hypervisor system, including a plurality of host sites, each site including at least one hypervisor, each of which includes at least one virtual server, at least one virtual disk read from and written to by the at least one virtual server, a tapping driver in communication with the at least one virtual server, which intercepts write requests made by any one of the at least one virtual server to any one of the at least one virtual disk, and a virtual data services appliance, in communication with the tapping driver, which receives the intercepted write requests from the tapping driver, and which provides data services based thereon, and a data services manager for coordinating the virtual data services appliances at the site, and a network for communicatively coupling the plurality of sites, wherein the data services managers coordinate data transfer across the plurality of sites via the network.

Abstract: Certain aspects direct to system for performing efficient failover and virtual machine (VM) migration in virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI). The system includes a plurality of computing devices functioning as nodes, and a virtual desktop controller. The virtual desktop controller includes a processor, a memory, and a storage device storing computer executable code. The code, when executed at the processor, is configured to configure the computing devices as a failover cluster of the system; assign one computing device as an active node; assign each of the other computing devices as a passive node, and configure a clustered shared volume (CSV) of physical disks as backup nodes of the active node; and monitor the computing devices of the failover cluster. When the active node of the failover cluster fails, the executed code configures assigns one of the passive node of the failover cluster as a new active node.

Abstract: The present disclosure includes systems and techniques relating to providing hardware support for processing virtual machine instructions. In some implementations, an apparatus, systems, or methods can include an interface for a system-on-chip (SOC), a memory device, a central processing unit (CPU) coupled with the interface and the memory device, where the CPU can be configured to process instructions defined by a first instruction set and to direct instructions defined by a second instruction set to the memory device, and processing hardware coupled with the interface and the memory device, where the processing hardware can be separate from the CPU and configured to retrieve and process the instructions defined by the second instruction set, and where the second instruction set can be different from the first instruction set, and the instructions defined by the second instruction set include code of a predefined virtual machine environment.

Abstract: In one embodiment, a method comprises creating a hierarchal chain of network services in response to instantiation within a data center of a virtualized application providing an application service, the chain having a corresponding hierarchal proxy endpoint identifier for each network service in the chain; registering the chain of network services as a logical path for reaching the application service within the data center; and routing, within the data center, a web-based service request for the application service to the chain of network services for execution by the virtualized application.

Abstract: Clients accessing cloud computing services are allocated respective virtual machines, each client specifying defining parameters for its virtual machine(s). A just-in-time compiler executing within a client's virtual machine optimizes the executable code it generates based at least in part, on the defining parameters of the virtual machine. During execution of an application using the just-in-time compiler, the compiler is notified of changes made to the defining parameters of the virtual machine. Responsive to such notification, the just-in-time compiler thereafter optimizes compiled code it generates for execution in the virtual machine as modified.