Patent ID: 8402461
Filing Date: 2013-03-19
Classification: G06F

Abstract:
1. A system comprising: one or more computing devices; a hardware device; a first virtual machine implemented on a first of the computing devices to generate input/output (I/O) requests to the hardware device; a second virtual machine implemented on a second of the computing devices; a mechanism to switch between a direct mode and an indirect mode without switching between a first context and a second context of the hardware device, wherein in the direct mode, the I/O requests generated by the first virtual machine are to be sent to the hardware device without being redirected to the second virtual machine, wherein in the indirect mode, the I/O requests generated by the first virtual machine are to be redirected to the second virtual machine for processing, and the second virtual machine is to, after processing the I/O requests redirected to the second virtual machine, send the I/O requests to the hardware device, wherein to switch from the direct mode to the indirect mode, the mechanism is to replace a first version of a component of a first driver of the first virtual machine with a second version of the component, the first version particular to the hardware device to transmit the I/O requests without passing through the second virtual machine the second version to transmit the I/O requests to the second virtual machine over an I/O channel.