Grant: Collaborative Research and Development Grants

Virtualization is fast becoming a critical technology in modern data centers. Server virtualization allows software to be deployed on virtual servers, which can then be hosted on a pool of physical machines. This makes it easy, for example, to move a software service from a smaller physical host to a more powerful one, or to move services off of a physical host that has failed or is in need of maintenance or repair. Virtualization also supports resource consolidation in data centers. Instead of physically overprovisioning each software application to accommodate that application's peak load, virtualized applications dynamically and flexibly share a common, consolidated pool of physical resources. The goal of this project is to develop techniques for automating the administration of virtual database appliances, which are database management systems that are deployed on virtual servers. We propose to develop techniques for automatically adjusting the physical resources that are used to host a virtual database appliance, so that the database system will be able to attain specified performance targets. We propose to develop techniques for automatically scaling up virtual database appliances over time as their workload grows. Finally, we propose to to develop techniques for minimizing the power required to host a given set of virtual database appliances on a pool of physical servers.