Patent ID: 7213246

Claim:
An apparatus comprising: a first computer system configured to execute, in a first virtual machine, a first application and an operating system on which the first application is designed to execute; and a second computer system coupled to the first computer system, wherein, in response to a failure on the first computer system, the first virtual machine is failed over to the second computer system, wherein the second computer system is coupled to receive a message requesting the failover, and wherein the second computer system is configured to obtain an image of the first virtual machine, and wherein the second computer system is configured to begin executing the first virtual machine from the image responsive to receiving the message requesting the failover; wherein the first computer system is further configured to execute a second application in a second virtual machine, the second application configured to initiate the failover of the first virtual machine to the second computer in response to the failure, and wherein the second application is configured to transmit the message.