IncludeOS: a unikernel for C++ applications [LWN.net]

IncludeOS: a unikernel for C++ applications

Posted Jul 26, 2017 10:47 UTC (Wed) by nix (subscriber, #2304)
In reply to: IncludeOS: a unikernel for C++ applications by Sesse
Parent article: IncludeOS: a unikernel for C++ applications

You also lose multiple major benefits of normal OSes. The unikernel is almost certainly not as scalable, tested, or featureful as the kernel it replaces (definitely true here!), and you are essentially taking yourself back to the 1960s, when all OSes were distinct monsters tied to specific preferred languages with unique APIs, and if you wanted to introduce something in a different language you were suddenly writing lots of bridging layers: as for switching away from IncludeOS if you found you needed something a real kernel can provide, forget it.

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IncludeOS: a unikernel for C++ applications

Posted Jul 26, 2017 12:59 UTC (Wed) by mato (guest, #964) [Link]

> You also lose multiple major benefits of normal OSes. The unikernel is almost certainly not as scalable, tested, or featureful as the kernel it replaces (definitely true here!)

That's only partially true. Modern green-field unikernels can provide better implementations of existing features (e.g. MirageOS' type- and memory-safe TCP/IP and TLS stacks). And the implementations will mature with time and use, as does all software.

> and you are essentially taking yourself back to the 1960s, when all OSes were distinct monsters tied to specific preferred languages with unique APIs, and if you wanted to introduce something in a different language you were suddenly writing lots of bridging layers

I'd argue that you'd face the same problem (bridging language "worlds" and competing runtimes) in any conventional application where you use multiple languages in the same *process*.