Using Virtual Machine Cloning To Create a Backup Virtual Machine in a Fault Tolerant System

Techniques for creating a fault tolerant system in a virtual machine environment utilize a primary VM and a backup VM. To initialize the fault tolerant system, the backup VM and primary VM start from the same state. To achieve this in one embodiment, the primary VM is suspended and the state of the...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors SCALES DANIEL J, TUCKER ANDREW, NELSON MICHAEL
Format Patent
LanguageEnglish
Published 30.04.2009
Subjects
CALCULATING
COMPUTING
COUNTING
ELECTRIC DIGITAL DATA PROCESSING
PHYSICS
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Summary:Techniques for creating a fault tolerant system in a virtual machine environment utilize a primary VM and a backup VM. To initialize the fault tolerant system, the backup VM and primary VM start from the same state. To achieve this in one embodiment, the primary VM is suspended and the state of the primary VM is copied to the backup VM. Once the backup VM has received all the primary VM's state, the primary VM is resumed. Subsequent state changes of the primary VM are buffered until the backup VM resumes, connects to the primary VM, and starts consuming the buffered content. Thereafter, synchronization is maintained by the primary VM's writing relevant state changes to a log and the backup VM's reading such relevant state changes from the log.
Bibliography:Application Number: US20080258185