# US 10,871,925 B2 · Provisioning data volumes for containers running in virtual machines

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- Number: US 10,871,925 B2
- Document ID: US10871925B2
- Status: Granted
- Kind: B2
- Application number: 15/608,865
- Filed: 2017-05-30
- Published: 2017-11-30
- Granted: 2020-12-22
- Earliest claimed: 2016-05-31
- Assignees: VMware, Inc.
- Applicants: VMware, Inc.
- Inventors: Mark Sterin; Govindan Thirumal Thiruvengada; Ritesh H. Shukla; Andrew Stone; Prashant Dhamdhere
- Web page: https://patentgrep.com/patent/US10871925B2

## CPC

- G06F 3/0665: {at area level, e.g. provisioning of virtual or logical volumes}
- G06F 3/0605: {by facilitating the interaction with a user or administrator}
- G06F 3/0608: {Saving storage space on storage systems}
- G06F 3/0619: {in relation to data integrity, e.g. data losses, bit errors}
- G06F 3/0631: {by allocating resources to storage systems}
- G06F 3/0632: {by initialisation or re-initialisation of storage systems}
- G06F 3/0653: {Monitoring storage devices or systems}
- G06F 3/067: {Distributed or networked storage systems, e.g. storage area networks [SAN], network attached storage [NAS]}
- G06F 3/0689: {Disk arrays, e.g. RAID, JBOD}
- G06F 9/45558: {Hypervisor-specific management and integration aspects}
- G06F 9/544: {Buffers; Shared memory; Pipes}
- G06F 2009/45562: {Creating, deleting, cloning virtual machine instances}
- G06F 2009/45579: {I/O management, e.g. providing access to device drivers or storage}
- G06F 2009/45583: {Memory management, e.g. access or allocation}
- G06F: ELECTRIC DIGITAL DATA PROCESSING (computer systems based on specific computational models G06N)

## Abstract

A computer system has a virtualization software that supports execution of a virtual machine in which a container is run. A method of provisioning a data volume for the container in this computer system includes the steps of monitoring a designated virtual socket, detecting, based on the monitoring, a request from a plug-in of the container to create a data volume, and upon detecting the request, communicating the request to the virtualization software to cause the virtualization software to create the data volume.

## Claims

### Claim 1

In a computer system having a virtualization software on which a virtual machine is run, the virtualization software supporting execution of the virtual machine in which a container is run, the virtual machine comprising a guest operating system on which the container executes, the container comprising one or more applications deployed therein, a method of provisioning a data volume for the container, comprising:
monitoring, by the virtualization software, a designated virtual socket of the virtual machine, wherein the virtual socket enables the virtual machine to communicate with the virtualization software;
based on said monitoring, detecting, by a component running within the virtualization software, a request from a plug-in of the container to create a data volume, the data volume backed by a storage device, the plug-in providing an interface between the container and the virtualization software, wherein the virtualization software is configured to provide an interface between the plug-in and the storage device; and
upon detecting the request, communicating, by the component, the request to the virtualization software to cause the virtualization software to create the data volume.

### Claim 2 (depends on 1)

The method of claim 1, wherein the designated virtual socket is accessed through a privileged port of an inter-process communication interface.

### Claim 3 (depends on 2)

The method of claim 2, wherein the plug-in executes in root mode and communicates the request through the privileged port of the inter-process communication interface.

### Claim 4 (depends on 1)

The method of claim 1, further comprising:
upon detecting the request and after communicating the request to the virtualization software to cause the virtualization software to create the data volume, communicating a request to the virtualization software to attach the data volume to the virtual machine;
after the data volume is attached to the virtual machine, formatting the data volume with a file system; and
after formatting the data volume with the file system, communicating a request to the virtualization software to detach the data volume from the virtual machine.

### Claim 5 (depends on 4)

The method of claim 4, wherein the virtualization software attaches the data volume to the virtual machine by adding an identifier of the data volume to a configuration file of the virtual machine and detaches the data volume from the virtual machine by removing the identifier of the data volume from the configuration file of the virtual machine.

### Claim 6 (depends on 1)

The method of claim 1, further comprising:
based on said monitoring, detecting a request from the plug-in of the container to map a data volume to a namespace used by the container;
upon detecting the request to map, determining if the data volume has been created;
if the data volume has been created, mounting a file system for the data volume into the namespace used by the container so as to map the data volume to a folder accessible by the container; and
if the data volume has not been created, returning an error.

### Claim 7 (depends on 6)

The method of claim 6, wherein the data volume that the plug-in of the container is requesting to map is the same data volume that the plug-in of the container requested to create.

### Claim 8 (depends on 6)

The method of claim 6, wherein the data volume that the plug-in of the container is requesting to map is different from the data volume that the plug-in of the container requested to create.

### Claim 9 (depends on 8)

The method of claim 8, wherein the data volume that the plug-in of the container is requesting to map is a data volume that a plug-in of a different container requested to create.

### Claim 10

A non-transitory computer readable medium comprising instructions to be executed in a computer system having a virtualization software on which a virtual machine is run, the virtualization software supporting execution of the virtual machine in which a container is run, the virtual machine comprising a guest operating system on which the container executes, the container comprising one or more applications deployed therein, wherein the instructions when executed cause the computer system to carry out a method of provisioning a data volume for the container, said method comprising:
monitoring, by the virtualization software, a designated virtual socket of the virtual machine, wherein the virtual socket enables the virtual machine to communicate with the virtualization software;
based on said monitoring, detecting, by a component running within the virtualization software, a request from a plug-in of the container to create a data volume, the data volume backed by a storage device, the plug-in providing an interface between the container and the virtualization software, wherein the virtualization software is configured to provide an interface between the plug-in and the storage device; and
upon detecting the request, communicating, by the component, the request to the virtualization software to cause the virtualization software to create the data volume.

### Claim 11 (depends on 10)

The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 10, wherein the designated virtual socket is accessed through a privileged port of an inter-process communication interface.

### Claim 12 (depends on 11)

The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 11, wherein the plug-in executes in root mode and communicates the request through the privileged port of the inter-process communication interface.

### Claim 13 (depends on 10)

The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 10, wherein the method further comprises:
upon detecting the request and after communicating the request to the virtualization software to cause the virtualization software to create the data volume, communicating a request to the virtualization software to attach the data volume to the virtual machine;
after the data volume is attached to the virtual machine, formatting the data volume with a file system; and
after formatting the data volume with the file system, communicating a request to the virtualization software to detach the data volume from the virtual machine.

### Claim 14 (depends on 13)

The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 13, wherein the virtualization software attaches the data volume to the virtual machine by adding an identifier of the data volume to a configuration file of the virtual machine and detaches the data volume from the virtual machine by removing the identifier of the data volume from the configuration file of the virtual machine.

### Claim 15 (depends on 10)

The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 10, wherein the method further comprises:
based on said monitoring, detecting a request from the plug-in of the container to map a data volume to a namespace used by the container;
upon detecting the request to map, determining if the data volume has been created;
if the data volume has been created, mounting a file system for the data volume into the namespace used by the container so as to map the data volume to a folder accessible by the container; and
if the data volume has not been created, returning an error.

### Claim 16 (depends on 15)

The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 15, wherein the data volume that the plug-in of the container is requesting to map is the same data volume that the plug-in of the container requested to create.

### Claim 17 (depends on 15)

The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 15, wherein the data volume that the plug-in of the container is requesting to map is different from the data volume that the plug-in of the container requested to create.

### Claim 18 (depends on 17)

The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 17, wherein the data volume that the plug-in of the container is requesting to map is a data volume that a plug-in of a different container requested to create.

### Claim 19

A computer system having a first host computer system including a first virtualization software on which a first virtual machine is run, the virtualization software supporting execution of the first virtual machine in which a first container is run, and a second host computer system including a second virtualization software supporting execution of a second virtual machine in which a second container is run, the first virtual machine comprising a guest operating system on which the first container executes, the first container comprising one or more applications deployed therein, wherein the first virtualization software has a first background process running therein to perform the steps of:
monitoring, by the virtualization software, a first designated virtual socket of the first virtual machine, wherein the first designated virtual socket enables the first virtual machine to communicate with the first virtualization software;
based on the monitoring of the first designated virtual socket, detecting a request from a plug-in of the first container to create a data volume, the data volume backed by a storage device, the plug-in providing an interface between the container and the virtualization software, wherein the virtualization software is configured to provide an interface between the plug-in and the storage device; and
upon detecting the request, communicating the request to the first virtualization software to cause the first virtualization software to create the data volume.

### Claim 20 (depends on 19)

The computer system of claim 19, wherein the second virtualization software has a second background process running therein to perform the steps of:
monitoring a second designated virtual socket;
based on the monitoring of the second designated virtual socket, detecting a request from a plug-in of the second container to map the data volume to a namespace used by the second container;
upon detecting the request to map, determining if the data volume has been created;
if the data volume has been created, mounting a file system for the data volume into the namespace used by the second container so as to map the data volume to a folder accessible by the second container; and
if the data volume has not been created, returning an error.