Patent ID: 8589917

Claim:
A method for transferring data between guest virtual machines, said method comprising: a processor of a host computer system intercepting, using a hypervisor, a request to transfer a file from a first machine to a second machine, said first machine being a first guest virtual machine located on the host computer system; after said intercepting, said processor ascertaining that the second machine is a second guest virtual machine located on the host computer system; and in response to said ascertaining, said processor: (i) transferring the file from image storage of the first guest virtual machine to an operating system image of the first guest virtual machine, (ii) directly transferring the file from the operating system image of the first guest virtual machine to an operating system image of the second guest virtual machine via a virtual machine interconnect bus within the host computer system, and (iii) transferring the file from the operating system image of the second guest virtual machine to image storage of the second guest virtual machine.