KVM 15 [LWN.net]

KVM 15

Posted Mar 1, 2007 7:13 UTC (Thu) by avik (subscriber, #704)
Parent article: KVM 15

In addition to relying on hardware virtualization, kvm has two additional advantages:

it relies on the kernel for the stuff the kernel is good at: scheduling, memory management, security, I/O, power management; the list goes on and on.
it relies on qemu for the stuff qemu is good at: emulation. kvm only uses the chipset and I/O emulation (and not the cpu emulation), but a world of work was saved by using qemu. Live migration, for example, is actually a qemu project which was adapted to also support kvm.

By relying on the kernel and qemu, kvm is able to focus firmly on virtualization issues. That is what makes the fast development pace possible.

[I'm the kvm maintainer]

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KVM 15

Posted Mar 1, 2007 10:50 UTC (Thu) by ekj (subscriber, #1524) [Link]

Ah, I see what you're trying -- trying to give all those *other* projects the honour.

It won't work. We'll still consider you a cool potato. This is the kinda thing that makes my Windows-using co-workers go; "Linux can do *what*?" which happens at increasing frequency lately.

KVM 15

Posted Mar 1, 2007 11:31 UTC (Thu) by avik (subscriber, #704) [Link]

Ah, I see what you're trying -- trying to give all those *other* projects the honour.

Well, er, yes.

It could also be interpreted as an mean and underhanded swipe at other virtualization projects which have written their own kernel. I'm sure no one on LWN would suggest that I'd make such an insinuation, though.

It won't work. We'll still consider you a cool potato. This is the kinda thing that makes my Windows-using co-workers go; "Linux can do *what*?" which happens at increasing frequency lately.

It's all part of the master plan. I get to be a cool potato (potato?!) *and* appear to be generous soul who's only wish is to see the credit go where it really belongs.

KVM 15

Posted Mar 9, 2007 17:04 UTC (Fri) by slamb (guest, #1070) [Link]

Perhaps some day you can aspire to being "poa mchizi com ndizi", or "cool crazy like a banana".

KVM 15

Posted Mar 5, 2007 13:03 UTC (Mon) by joern (subscriber, #22392) [Link]

Actually, I consider relying on hardware virtualization the smallest advantage of all. Even if the paravirtualization approach makes sense - and in many cases it does - there is no reason to re-implement a scheduler, memory management, hardware-bug workarounds, etc.

The ultimate hypervisor is the Linux kernel and kvm is the first widely-available project to take advantage of it.