Tightly-Coupled TCP Control Blocks for Virtual Machine Data Transfer
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Solution Overview
Problem
Virtual computer systems with multiple operating systems require significant resources to communicate using networking protocols like TCP, leading to double copying of data and inefficient processing due to the need for complex control blocks and network protocols.
Innovation Solution
Implementing tightly-coupled TCP communication by coupling TCP control blocks across different operating systems, allowing for direct data transfer and eliminating the need for traditional TCP processing steps, such as segmentation and acknowledgement, through a hypervisor or network interface card.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If traditional TCP protocols are used for communication between different operating systems in a virtual computer system, then reliable data delivery is ensured, but data copying and processing overhead increase significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges the TCP control blocks of two different operating systems into a single unified control block managed by the hypervisor. This consolidation eliminates the need for separate TCBs in each guest OS, thereby reducing data copying overhead while maintaining TCP's reliable data delivery through the unified control structure that coordinates both ends of the connection.
Solution Approach 2:
The hypervisor acts as an intermediary between the two different operating systems, managing the TCP connection and controlling data transfer. By introducing this intermediate layer, the system can coordinate TCP operations across guest OS boundaries without requiring each guest OS to maintain its own full TCP stack, thus reducing processing overhead while ensuring reliable delivery.
2Adaptability or versatility
If TCP control blocks are maintained separately in each operating system, then each OS can independently manage connections, but resource requirements and processing overhead double
Solution Approach 1:
The patent combines separate TCP control blocks into a single unified TCB managed by the hypervisor. This merging reduces the total resource requirements and processing overhead that would otherwise double when each guest OS maintains its own TCB, while the hypervisor retains the ability to manage connections across different operating systems.
Solution Approach 2:
The hypervisor serves as a universal connection manager that handles TCP connections between different operating systems. This multi-functional approach allows the system to maintain connection management capabilities across heterogeneous OS environments without requiring each individual OS to maintain separate full TCP stacks, thereby reducing overall resource requirements.
3Reliability
If data is transferred using conventional TCP protocols with headers and checksums, then data integrity is verified, but multiple data copies are required increasing processing time
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts the TCP control block management function from the guest operating systems and places it in the hypervisor. This extraction allows the hypervisor to handle TCP overhead operations such as header processing and checksum verification centrally, eliminating the need for multiple data copies that would occur if each guest OS processed these operations independently.
Data Source
AI summary
First and second operating systems of a virtual computer system can communicate using respective first and second network protocol stacks, by employing procedures that are specialized for a situation in which a TCP control block of the first stack and a TCP control block of the second stack correspond to the same logical connection. In this case, various TCP requirements can be bypassed by coupling the TCP control blocks, reducing or eliminating data copies and providing other efficiencies.