Patent ID: 8532973

Claim:
A virtualized clustered storage server system, comprising: a set of one or more host computers, each having a host operating system; and a plurality of virtual computers, each operating on a host computer of the set of host computers, each of the virtual computers having one or more virtualization components and a guest operating system, said guest operating system being hosted by said host operating system of the host computer, wherein each virtual computer comprises a storage server system instance, the storage server system instance comprising said guest operating system and at least one facility including at least one simulated storage device for storing data of at least one virtual volume, wherein the storage server system instances and the simulated storage devices execute within the virtual computers to operate as the virtualized clustered storage server system, wherein each storage server system instance is executed as the guest operating system, wherein each of the set of host computers is operative to, receive commands of a user for manipulating data of a specified virtual volume of the virtualized clustered storage server system, wherein each command is directed to a specified storage server system instance operating on that host computer, and route each of the user commands to the respective specified storage server system instance through a virtual interface of the one or more virtualization components of the respective virtual computer, wherein each storage server system instance is operative to, transmit, in response to receipt of a routed user command to manipulate data of a specified virtual volume of a different storage server system instance, a request to manipulate the data of the specified virtual volume to the different storage server system instance using one or more emulated cluster network adapters, and manipulate said data of said specified virtual volume stored on the simulated storage device in accordance with the respective user command, and wherein said at least one facility of each storage server system instance is mapped onto at least one corresponding facility of the host operating system of the respective host computer via the virtualization components of the respective virtual computer.