Patent ID: 8661120

Claim:
A computer-implemented method for dynamically managing requests for computing capacity provided by a program execution service (PES), the method comprising: under control of the PES that provides a plurality of computing nodes that are each configurable to execute one or more programs of multiple users of the PES, the PES further providing a plurality of user-customizable program services, comprising (1) a user-customizable load balancer configured to allow a user to distribute workload across one or more of the plurality of computing nodes or one or more instances of the virtualization environment, (2) a monitoring interface configured to allow the user to monitor execution of the program, and (3) a load scaler configured to scale computing resources of the PES in response to variations in demand for execution of the program; receiving from a user of the PES a request to generate a virtualization environment for execution of a user application during a requested period of time, the request comprising information associated with the user application that permits the PES to execute a program based at least in part on the user application; automatically generating the virtualization environment based on the user application, the virtualization environment including a user-selectable operating system and at least one of the user-customizable program services provided by the PES; determining from the plurality of computing nodes of the PES a group of computing nodes that can satisfy the request by the user; executing one or more instances of the virtualization environment on the group of computing nodes during the requested period of time; receiving from the user a request to make at least one change to the virtualization environment or to the one or more instances executing the virtualization environment on the group of computing nodes during the requested period of time, wherein the at least one change comprises a change to the user-selectable operating system; and automatically implementing the at least one change during the requested period of time.