Invention Grant
- Patent Title: Unified hypercall interface across processors in virtualized computing systems
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Application No.: US16744356Application Date: 2020-01-16
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Publication No.: US11550609B2Publication Date: 2023-01-10
- Inventor: Andrei Warkentin , Cyprien Laplace , Regis Duchesne , Alexander Fainkichen , Shruthi Muralidhara Hiriyuru , Ye Li
- Applicant: VMware, Inc.
- Applicant Address: US CA Palo Alto
- Assignee: VMware, Inc.
- Current Assignee: VMware, Inc.
- Current Assignee Address: US CA Palo Alto
- Agency: Dinsmore & Shohl LLP
- Main IPC: G06F9/455
- IPC: G06F9/455

Abstract:
An example method of interfacing with a hypervisor in a computing system is described, which includes a processor having at least three hierarchical privilege levels including a third privilege level more privileged than a second privilege level, the second privilege level more privileged than a first privilege level. The method includes: identifying an input/output (I/O) space instruction, not supported by the processor, to be performed for backdoor communication between the hypervisor and guest software executing in a virtual machine (VM) managed by the hypervisor, the hypervisor executing at the third privilege level; writing one or more parameters to one or more registers of the processor that are mapped to one or more unsupported registers used by the I/O space instruction; writing a value indicative of the I/O space instruction to a designated register of the processor; executing an instruction, by the guest software executing at the first or second privilege level, which is trapped to the third privilege level.
Public/Granted literature
- US20210224090A1 UNIFIED HYPERCALL INTERFACE ACROSS PROCESSORS IN VIRTUALIZED COMPUTING SYSTEMS Public/Granted day:2021-07-22
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