Deploying disk images
AssigneeMicrosoft Corporation
InventorsPeter John Hill, Gary N. Wright, Darren P. Loher
Life of this patent
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Abstract
The present invention extends to methods, systems, and computer program products for deploying disk images. Various common disk images can be examined (e.g., within a data center) to identify a set of blocks that match between multiple, related images (i.e., common blocks). Both the common blocks and different blocks can be stored in a composite disk image. When a request for a machine running a specific production disk image is made, hardware with a pre-cached composite disk image can be located. Rules can be applied to the composite disk image to transform the composite disk image into the requested production disk image.
Claims20
A method for deploying a production disk image, the method comprising:
- receiving a request to deploy a production disk image, the production disk image to include one or more software components;
- accessing a composite disk image, the composite disk image including a plurality of data blocks and one or more transformation rules, the plurality of data blocks containing data for a plurality of different software components, the plurality of data blocks including one or more common data blocks and one or more unique data blocks, the one or more common data blocks common to a plurality of different possible production disk images, the one or more unique data blocks unique between at least some of the plurality of different possible disk images, the one or more transformation rules defining how to process the plurality of data blocks to deploy any of a plurality of different production disk images;
- identifying a transformation rule corresponding to the production disk image based on the received request, the transformation rule identified from among the one or more transformation rules included in the composite disk image;
- and
- deploying the production disk image to a portion of a storage device by applying the transformation rule to the plurality of data blocks.
A computer program product for use at a computer system, the computer program product for implementing method for deploying a production disk image, the computer program product comprising one or more computer storage devices having stored thereon computer-executable instructions that, when executed at a processor, cause the computer system to perform the method, including the following:
- receive a request to deploy a production disk image, the production disk image to include one or more software components;
- access a composite disk image, the composite disk image including a plurality of data blocks and one or more transformation rules, the plurality of data blocks containing data for a plurality of different software components, the plurality of data blocks including one or more common data blocks and one or more unique data blocks, the one or more common data blocks common to a plurality of different possible production disk images, the one or more unique data blocks unique between at least some of the plurality of different possible disk images, the one or more transformation rules defining how to process the plurality of data blocks to deploy any of a plurality of different production disk images;
- identify a transformation rule corresponding to the production disk image based on the received request, the transformation rule identified from among one or more transformation rules included in the composite disk image;
- and
- deploy the production disk image to a portion of a storage device by applying the transformation rule to the plurality of data blocks.
A computer system, the computer system comprising:
- one or more processors;
- system memory;
- and
- one or more computer storage devices having stored thereon:
- a composite disk image, the composite disk image including a plurality of data blocks and one or more transformation rules, the plurality of data blocks containing data for a plurality of different software components, the plurality of data blocks including one or more common data blocks and one or more unique data blocks, the one or more common data blocks common to a plurality of different possible production disk images, the one or more unique data blocks unique between at least some of the plurality of different possible disk images, the transformation rules defining how to process the plurality of data blocks to deploy any of a plurality of different production disk images;
- and
- computer-executable instructions representing a deployment module, the deployment module configured to:
- receive a request to deploy a production disk image, the production disk image to include one or more software components;
- access the composite disk image;
- identify a transformation rule corresponding to the production disk image based on the received request, the transformation rule identified from among the plurality of transformation rules included in the composite disk image;
- and
- deploy the production disk image to a portion of a storage device by applying the transformation rule to the plurality of data blocks, the storage device selected from among the one or more computer storage devices.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.