Granted Patent B2

US 8,805,989 · App. 13/531,744 · Granted Aug 12, 2014

Abstract

Claims (53)

1. A data processing system for hosting virtual machines in a cloud computing environment comprising:

a first production cloud, operated at a first data processing platform at a first location, and for providing a set of virtual machines to a first set of customers;

a second production cloud, operated on a second data processing platform at a second location;

the second data processing platform also operating a continuity production cloud for the first set of customers;

a cloud management service for:

maintaining configuration of the set of virtual machines in the first production cloud as two or more Virtual Data Centers (VDCs) for a specific customer in the first set of customers;

selective enablement of a business continuity service for failing over selected elements of the production cloud to the continuity production cloud on a per-customer and per-VDC basis,

such that only a subset of the VDCs for the specific customer are enabled for failing over to the continuity production cloud, and

wherein the selective enablement for failing over is further for:

reassigning network addresses;

updating firewall rules;

creating virtual private networks;

configuring load-balancing options;

creating virtual local area networks; and

bringing online VMs as specified by the user for each continuity enabled VDC.

2. The system of claim 1 wherein elements of the subset of VDCs enabled for failure are selected from a group consisting of virtual data processors, firewalls, load balancers, and virtual local area networks.

3. The system of claim 1 wherein the first and second data processing platforms further each comprise:

a replication service, for providing data replication between the first and second location.

4. The system of claim 3 wherein the replication service operates independently of the production cloud and the continuity cloud.

5. The system of claim 1 wherein the first and second data processing platforms further each comprise:

a network interface, for providing secure communication between the production and continuity clouds, such that the first customer is prevented from accessing production or continuity clouds provided for other customers.

6. The system of claim 5 wherein the network interface uses Secure Socket Layer (SSL), Virtual Private Network (VPN) or other security protocols.

7. The system of claim 5 wherein the replication service implements data replication services on a per customer basis, and the cloud management service permits the user to select these services from one or more of mirroring, failover, and failback to be enabled at time of test or time of disaster.

8. The system of claim 5 wherein the network interfaces further comprise:

a floating network address protocol, enabled upon a time of test or time of disaster, to translate network addresses for the source cloud to network addresses for the target cloud.

9. The system of claim 1 wherein the first and second data processing platforms each further comprise one or more redundant data processing elements to ensure that the business continuity service continues to operate in the event of a failure of a single element.

10. The system of claim 1 wherein the cloud management service further enables the first customer to specify Service Level Agreement (SLA) information including one or more of cost, Recovery Point Objective (RPO) and Recovery Time Objective (RTO).

11. The system of claim 1 wherein the cloud management service enables the first user to disable the business continuity service on a per-customer, per-VDC, or per-VM basis.

12. The system of claim 1 wherein the cloud management service further enables the first customer to specify which one of several possible data processing platforms at several locations are to provide the target production cloud for the first user.

13. The system of claim 1 wherein the cloud management system provides a visual interface for displaying status of the business continuity service on a per-user, per-VDC basis.

14. The system of claim 1 wherein the cloud management system provides an output to the first customer upon failure of the production cloud.

15. The system of claim 1 wherein the cloud management service further maintains configuration of the virtual machines for at least the subset of VDCs enabled for failing over such that a recovery order is specified for the VMs in the subset of VDCs.

16. A method for operating a cloud computing environment comprising:

operating a first production cloud using a first data processing platform at a first location, and providing a set of virtual machines to a first customer;

operating a second production cloud using a second data processing platform at a second location;

the second data processing platform also operating as a continuity production cloud for the first customer;

maintaining configuration of the set of virtual machines as two or more Virtual Data Centers (VDCs) for at least a specific customer in the first set of customers; and

selectively enabling a business continuity service for failing over selected elements of the production cloud to the continuity cloud on a per-customer and per-VDC basis,

such that only a subset of the VDCs for the specific customer are enabled for failing over the continuity production cloud; and

in an event of a disaster at the production cloud, the method comprises further steps carried out at the continuity cloud as follows:

network addresses are re-assigned;

firewall rules are updated;

virtual private networks are created;

load-balancing options are configured;

virtual local area networks are created; and

a recovery plan is executed for each continuity enabled VDC to bring online VMs as specified by the user in an order of recovery.

17. The method of claim 16 wherein an event of a disaster at the production cloud, the method comprises further steps carried out at the continuity cloud as follows:

standby network interfaces are activated; and

the recovered VMs are rebalanced.

18. The method of claim 16 wherein an event of a test at the production cloud, the method comprises further steps carried out at the continuity cloud as follows:

virtual machine disks are cloned; and

DNS updates are initiated for the recovered VMs.

19. The method of claim 15 wherein the step of maintaining configuration of the set of virtual machines for the subset of VDCs that are enabled for failing over such that a VM recovery order is specified on a per-VM basis.

Assignments (16)