Low-latency shared memory channel across address spaces in a computing system

A non-transitory computer readable medium having instructions stored thereon that when executed by a processor cause the processor to perform a method of a method of communication between a client driver and a filesystem server in a virtualized computing system, the client driver executing in a virtual machine (VM) and the filesystem server executing in a hypervisor managing the VM, the method comprising:

• allocating, by the client driver, shared memory in an address space of the VM for the communication;
• sending identification information for the shared memory from the client driver to the filesystem server through an inter-process communication channel between the client driver and the filesystem server;
• identifying, by the filesystem server in cooperation with a kernel of the hypervisor, the shared memory within an address space of the hypervisor, based on the identification information, to create a shared memory channel;
• sending commands from the client driver to the filesystem server through the shared memory channel;
• and
• receiving completion messages for the commands from the filesystem server to the client driver through the shared memory channel.

A virtualized computing system, comprising:

• a hardware platform including a processor and a memory;
• and
• a software platform having instructions stored in the memory and executing on the processor of the hardware platform, the software platform including a client driver executing in a virtual machine (VM) and a filesystem server executing in a hypervisor managing the VM, the software platform configured to:
• allocate, by the client driver, shared memory in an address space of the VM for the communication;
• send identification information for the shared memory from the client driver to the filesystem server through an inter-process communication channel between the client driver and the filesystem server;
• identify, by the filesystem server in cooperation with a kernel of the hypervisor, the shared memory within an address space of the hypervisor, based on the identification information, to create a shared memory channel;
• send commands from the client driver to the filesystem server through the shared memory channel;
• and
• receive completion messages for the commands from the filesystem server to the client driver through the shared memory channel.