Hypervisor

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A hypervisor, also known as a virtual machine monitor (VMM) or virtualizer, is a type of computer software, firmware or hardware that creates and runs virtual machines. A computer on which a hypervisor runs one or more virtual machines is called a host machine, and each virtual machine is called a guest machine. The hypervisor presents the guest operating systems with a virtual operating platform and manages the execution of the guest operating systems. Unlike an emulator, the guest executes most instructions on the native hardware. [1] Multiple instances of a variety of operating systems may share the virtualized hardware resources: for example, Linux, Windows, and macOS instances can all run on a single physical x86 machine. This contrasts with operating-system–level virtualization, where all instances (usually called containers) must share a single kernel, though the guest operating systems can differ in user space, such as different Linux distributions with the same kernel.

Contents

The term hypervisor is a variant of supervisor, a traditional term for the kernel of an operating system: the hypervisor is the supervisor of the supervisors, [2] with hyper- used as a stronger variant of super- . [lower-alpha 1] The term dates to circa 1970; [3] IBM coined it for the 360/65 [4] and later used it for the DIAG handler of CP-67. In the earlier CP/CMS (1967) system, the term Control Program was used instead.

Classification

Type-1 and type-2 hypervisors Hyperviseur.svg
Type-1 and type-2 hypervisors

In his 1973 thesis, "Architectural Principles for Virtual Computer Systems," Robert P. Goldberg classified two types of hypervisor: [1]

Type-1, native or bare-metal hypervisors
These hypervisors run directly on the host's hardware to control the hardware and to manage guest operating systems. For this reason, they are sometimes called bare-metal hypervisors. The first hypervisors, which IBM developed in the 1960s, were native hypervisors. [5] These included the test software SIMMON and the CP/CMS operating system, the predecessor of IBM's VM family of virtual machine operating systems.
Type-2 or hosted hypervisors
These hypervisors run on a conventional operating system (OS) just as other computer programs do. A virtual machine monitor runs as a process on the host, such as VirtualBox. Type-2 hypervisors abstract guest operating systems from the host operating system, effectively creating an isolated system that can be interacted with by the host.

The distinction between these two types is not always clear. For instance, KVM and bhyve are kernel modules [6] that effectively convert the host operating system to a type-1 hypervisor. [7]

Mainframe origins

The first hypervisors providing full virtualization were the test tool SIMMON and the one-off IBM CP-40 research system, which began production use in January 1967 and became the first version of the IBM CP/CMS operating system. CP-40 ran on a S/360-40 modified at the Cambridge Scientific Center to support dynamic address translation, a feature that enabled virtualization. Prior to this time, computer hardware had only been virtualized to the extent to allow multiple user applications to run concurrently, such as in CTSS and IBM M44/44X. With CP-40, the hardware's supervisor state was virtualized as well, allowing multiple operating systems to run concurrently in separate virtual machine contexts.

Programmers soon implemented CP-40 (as CP-67) for the IBM System/360-67, the first production computer system capable of full virtualization. IBM shipped this machine in 1966; it included page-translation-table hardware for virtual memory and other techniques that allowed a full virtualization of all kernel tasks, including I/O and interrupt handling. (Note that the "official" operating system, the ill-fated TSS/360, did not employ full virtualization.) Both CP-40 and CP-67 began production use in 1967. CP/CMS was available to IBM customers from 1968 to early 1970s, in source code form without support.

CP/CMS formed part of IBM's attempt to build robust time-sharing systems for its mainframe computers. By running multiple operating systems concurrently, the hypervisor increased system robustness and stability: Even if one operating system crashed, the others would continue working without interruption. Indeed, this even allowed beta or experimental versions of operating systemsor even of new hardware [8] to be deployed and debugged, without jeopardizing the stable main production system, and without requiring costly additional development systems.

IBM announced its System/370 series in 1970 without the virtual memory feature needed for virtualization, but added it in the August 1972 Advanced Function announcement. Virtualization has been featured in all successor systems, such that all modern-day IBM mainframes, including the zSeries line, retain backward compatibility with the 1960s-era IBM S/360 line. The 1972 announcement also included VM/370, a reimplementation of CP/CMS for the S/370. Unlike CP/CMS, IBM provided support for this version (though it was still distributed in source code form for several releases). VM stands for Virtual Machine , emphasizing that all, not just some, of the hardware interfaces are virtualized. Both VM and CP/CMS enjoyed early acceptance and rapid development by universities, corporate users, and time-sharing vendors, as well as within IBM. Users played an active role in ongoing development, anticipating trends seen in modern open source projects. However, in a series of disputed and bitter battles[ citation needed ], time-sharing lost out to batch processing through IBM political infighting, and VM remained IBM's "other" mainframe operating system for decades, losing to MVS. It enjoyed a resurgence of popularity and support from 2000 as the z/VM product, for example as the platform for Linux on IBM Z.

As mentioned above, the VM control program includes a hypervisor-call handler that intercepts DIAG ("Diagnose", opcode x'83') instructions used within a virtual machine. This provides fast-path non-virtualized execution of file-system access and other operations (DIAG is a model-dependent privileged instruction, not used in normal programming, and thus is not virtualized. It is therefore available for use as a signal to the "host" operating system). When first implemented in CP/CMS release 3.1, this use of DIAG provided an operating system interface that was analogous to the System/360 Supervisor Call instruction (SVC), but that did not require altering or extending the system's virtualization of SVC.

In 1985 IBM introduced the PR/SM hypervisor to manage logical partitions (LPAR).

Operating system support

Several factors led to a resurgence around 2005 in the use of virtualization technology among Unix, Linux, and other Unix-like operating systems: [9]

Major Unix vendors, including HP, IBM, SGI, and Sun Microsystems, have been selling virtualized hardware since before 2000. These have generally been large, expensive systems (in the multimillion-dollar range at the high end), although virtualization has also been available on some low- and mid-range systems, such as IBM pSeries servers, HP Superdome series machines, and Sun/Oracle T-series CoolThreads servers.

Although Solaris has always been the only guest domain OS officially supported by Sun/Oracle on their Logical Domains hypervisor, as of late 2006, Linux (Ubuntu and Gentoo), and FreeBSD have been ported to run on top of the hypervisor (and can all run simultaneously on the same processor, as fully virtualized independent guest OSes). Wind River "Carrier Grade Linux" also runs on Sun's Hypervisor. [10] Full virtualization on SPARC processors proved straightforward: since its inception in the mid-1980s Sun deliberately kept the SPARC architecture clean of artifacts that would have impeded virtualization. (Compare with virtualization on x86 processors below.) [11]

HPE provides HP Integrity Virtual Machines (Integrity VM) to host multiple operating systems on their Itanium powered Integrity systems. Itanium can run HP-UX, Linux, Windows and OpenVMS, and these environments are also supported as virtual servers on HP's Integrity VM platform. The HP-UX operating system hosts the Integrity VM hypervisor layer that allows for many important features of HP-UX to be taken advantage of and provides major differentiation between this platform and other commodity platforms - such as processor hotswap, memory hotswap, and dynamic kernel updates without system reboot. While it heavily leverages HP-UX, the Integrity VM hypervisor is really a hybrid that runs on bare-metal while guests are executing. Running normal HP-UX applications on an Integrity VM host is heavily discouraged,[ by whom? ] because Integrity VM implements its own memory management, scheduling and I/O policies that are tuned for virtual machines and are not as effective for normal applications. HPE also provides more rigid partitioning of their Integrity and HP9000 systems by way of VPAR and nPar technology, the former offering shared resource partitioning and the latter offering complete I/O and processing isolation. The flexibility of virtual server environment (VSE) has given way to its use more frequently in newer deployments.[ citation needed ]

IBM provides virtualization partition technology known as logical partitioning (LPAR) on System/390, zSeries, pSeries and IBM AS/400 systems. For IBM's Power Systems, the POWER Hypervisor (PHYP) is a native (bare-metal) hypervisor in firmware and provides isolation between LPARs. Processor capacity is provided to LPARs in either a dedicated fashion or on an entitlement basis where unused capacity is harvested and can be re-allocated to busy workloads. Groups of LPARs can have their processor capacity managed as if they were in a "pool" - IBM refers to this capability as Multiple Shared-Processor Pools (MSPPs) and implements it in servers with the POWER6 processor. LPAR and MSPP capacity allocations can be dynamically changed. Memory is allocated to each LPAR (at LPAR initiation or dynamically) and is address-controlled by the POWER Hypervisor. For real-mode addressing by operating systems (AIX, Linux, IBM i), the Power processors (POWER4 onwards) have designed virtualization capabilities where a hardware address-offset is evaluated with the OS address-offset to arrive at the physical memory address. Input/Output (I/O) adapters can be exclusively "owned" by LPARs or shared by LPARs through an appliance partition known as the Virtual I/O Server (VIOS). The Power Hypervisor provides for high levels of reliability, availability and serviceability (RAS) by facilitating hot add/replace of many parts (model dependent: processors, memory, I/O adapters, blowers, power units, disks, system controllers, etc.)

Similar trends have occurred with x86/x86-64 server platforms, where open-source projects such as Xen have led virtualization efforts. These include hypervisors built on Linux and Solaris kernels as well as custom kernels. Since these technologies span from large systems down to desktops, they are described in the next section.

x86 systems

X86 virtualization was introduced in the 1990s, with its emulation being included in Bochs. [12] Intel and AMD released their first x86 processors with hardware virtualisation in 2005 with Intel VT-x (code-named Vanderpool) and AMD-V (code-named Pacifica).

An alternative approach requires modifying the guest operating system to make a system call to the underlying hypervisor, rather than executing machine I/O instructions that the hypervisor simulates. This is called paravirtualization in Xen, a "hypercall" in Parallels Workstation, and a "DIAGNOSE code" in IBM VM. Some microkernels, such as Mach and L4, are flexible enough to allow paravirtualization of guest operating systems.

Embedded systems

Embedded hypervisors, targeting embedded systems and certain real-time operating system (RTOS) environments, are designed with different requirements when compared to desktop and enterprise systems, including robustness, security and real-time capabilities. The resource-constrained nature of many embedded systems, especially battery-powered mobile systems, imposes a further requirement for small memory-size and low overhead. Finally, in contrast to the ubiquity of the x86 architecture in the PC world, the embedded world uses a wider variety of architectures and less standardized environments. Support for virtualization requires memory protection (in the form of a memory management unit or at least a memory protection unit) and a distinction between user mode and privileged mode, which rules out most microcontrollers. This still leaves x86, MIPS, ARM and PowerPC as widely deployed architectures on medium- to high-end embedded systems. [13]

As manufacturers of embedded systems usually have the source code to their operating systems, they have less need for full virtualization in this space. Instead, the performance advantages of paravirtualization make this usually the virtualization technology of choice. Nevertheless, ARM and MIPS have recently added full virtualization support as an IP option and has included it in their latest high-end processors and architecture versions, such as ARM Cortex-A15 MPCore and ARMv8 EL2.

Other differences between virtualization in server/desktop and embedded environments include requirements for efficient sharing of resources across virtual machines, high-bandwidth, low-latency inter-VM communication, a global view of scheduling and power management, and fine-grained control of information flows. [14]

Security implications

The use of hypervisor technology by malware and rootkits installing themselves as a hypervisor below the operating system, known as hyperjacking , can make them more difficult to detect because the malware could intercept any operations of the operating system (such as someone entering a password) without the anti-malware software necessarily detecting it (since the malware runs below the entire operating system). Implementation of the concept has allegedly occurred in the SubVirt laboratory rootkit (developed jointly by Microsoft and University of Michigan researchers [15] ) as well as in the Blue Pill malware package. However, such assertions have been disputed by others who claim that it would be possible to detect the presence of a hypervisor-based rootkit. [16]

In 2009, researchers from Microsoft and North Carolina State University demonstrated a hypervisor-layer anti-rootkit called Hooksafe that can provide generic protection against kernel-mode rootkits. [17]

Notes

  1. super- is from Latin, meaning "above", while hyper- is from the cognate term in Ancient Greek (ὑπέρ-), also meaning above or over.

See also

Related Research Articles

In computing, a virtual machine (VM) is the virtualization or emulation of a computer system. Virtual machines are based on computer architectures and provide the functionality of a physical computer. Their implementations may involve specialized hardware, software, or a combination of the two. Virtual machines differ and are organized by their function, shown here:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Xen</span> Type-1 hypervisor

Xen is a free and open-source type-1 hypervisor, providing services that allow multiple computer operating systems to execute on the same computer hardware concurrently. It was originally developed by the University of Cambridge Computer Laboratory and is now being developed by the Linux Foundation with support from Intel, Citrix, Arm Ltd, Huawei, AWS, Alibaba Cloud, AMD, Bitdefender and epam.

x86 virtualization is the use of hardware-assisted virtualization capabilities on an x86/x86-64 CPU.

In computing, paravirtualization or para-virtualization is a virtualization technique that presents a software interface to the virtual machines which is similar, yet not identical, to the underlying hardware–software interface.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">QEMU</span> Free virtualization and emulation software

QEMU is a free and open-source emulator. It emulates a computer's processor through dynamic binary translation and provides a set of different hardware and device models for the machine, enabling it to run a variety of guest operating systems. It can interoperate with Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) to run virtual machines at near-native speed. QEMU can also do emulation for user-level processes, allowing applications compiled for one architecture to run on another.

Platform virtualization software, specifically emulators and hypervisors, are software packages that emulate the whole physical computer machine, often providing multiple virtual machines on one physical platform. The table below compares basic information about platform virtualization hypervisors.

A logical partition (LPAR) is a subset of a computer's hardware resources, virtualized as a separate computer. In effect, a physical machine can be partitioned into multiple logical partitions, each hosting a separate instance of an operating system.

Dynamic Logical Partitioning (DLPAR), is the capability of a logical partition (LPAR) to be reconfigured dynamically, without having to shut down the operating system that runs in the LPAR. DLPAR enables memory, CPU capacity, and I/O interfaces to be moved nondisruptively between LPARs within the same server.

IBM Z Family name used by IBM for its z/Architecture mainframe computers

IBM Z is a family name used by IBM for all of its z/Architecture mainframe computers. In July 2017, with another generation of products, the official family was changed to IBM Z from IBM z Systems; the IBM Z family now includes the newest model, the IBM z16, as well as the z15, the z14, and the z13, the IBM zEnterprise models, the IBM System z10 models, the IBM System z9 models and IBM eServer zSeries models.

In computing, hardware-assisted virtualization is a platform virtualization approach that enables efficient full virtualization using help from hardware capabilities, primarily from the host processors. A full virtualization is used to emulate a complete hardware environment, or virtual machine, in which an unmodified guest operating system effectively executes in complete isolation. Hardware-assisted virtualization was added to x86 processors in 2005, 2006 and 2010 (respectively).

The following is a timeline of virtualization development. In computing, virtualization is the use of a computer to simulate another computer. Through virtualization, a host simulates a guest by exposing virtual hardware devices, which may be done through software or by allowing access to a physical device connected to the machine.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">VMware ESXi</span> Enterprise-class, type-1 hypervisor for deploying and serving virtual computers

VMware ESXi is an enterprise-class, type-1 hypervisor developed by VMware, a subsidiary of Broadcom, for deploying and serving virtual computers. As a type-1 hypervisor, ESXi is not a software application that is installed on an operating system (OS); instead, it includes and integrates vital OS components, such as a kernel.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Full virtualization</span> Computing technique involving instances of an environment

In computer science, full virtualization (fv) is a modern virtualization technique developed in late 1990s. It is different from simulation and emulation. Virtualization employs techniques that can create instances of a virtual environment, as opposed to simulation, which models the environment; and emulation, which replicates the target environment with certain kinds of virtual environments called emulation environments for virtual machines. Full virtualization requires that every salient feature of the hardware be reflected into one of several virtual machines – including the full instruction set, input/output operations, interrupts, memory access, and whatever other elements are used by the software that runs on the bare machine, and that is intended to run in a virtual machine. In such an environment, any software capable of execution on the raw hardware can be run in the virtual machine and, in particular, any operating systems. The obvious test of full virtualization is whether an operating system intended for stand-alone use can successfully run inside a virtual machine.

Hardware virtualization is the virtualization of computers as complete hardware platforms, certain logical abstractions of their componentry, or only the functionality required to run various operating systems. Virtualization hides the physical characteristics of a computing platform from the users, presenting instead an abstract computing platform. At its origins, the software that controlled virtualization was called a "control program", but the terms "hypervisor" or "virtual machine monitor" became preferred over time.

In computing, virtualization or virtualisation in British English is the act of creating a virtual version of something at the same abstraction level, including virtual computer hardware platforms, storage devices, and computer network resources.

Oracle VM Server for x86 is the server virtualization offering from Oracle Corporation. Oracle VM Server for x86 incorporates the free and open-source Xen hypervisor technology, supports Windows, Linux, and Solaris guests and includes an integrated Web based management console. Oracle VM Server for x86 features fully tested and certified Oracle Applications stack in an enterprise virtualization environment.

Second Level Address Translation (SLAT), also known as nested paging, is a hardware-assisted virtualization technology which makes it possible to avoid the overhead associated with software-managed shadow page tables.

Linux on IBM Z or Linux on zSystems is the collective term for the Linux operating system compiled to run on IBM mainframes, especially IBM Z / IBM zSystems and IBM LinuxONE servers. Similar terms which imply the same meaning are Linux/390, Linux/390x, etc. The three Linux distributions certified for usage on the IBM Z hardware platform are Red Hat Enterprise Linux, SUSE Linux Enterprise Server, and Ubuntu.

In computing, a system virtual machine is a virtual machine (VM) that provides a complete system platform and supports the execution of a complete operating system (OS). These usually emulate an existing architecture, and are built with the purpose of either providing a platform to run programs where the real hardware is not available for use, or of having multiple instances of virtual machines leading to more efficient use of computing resources, both in terms of energy consumption and cost effectiveness, or both. A VM was originally defined by Popek and Goldberg as "an efficient, isolated duplicate of a real machine".

References

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  2. Bernard Golden (2011). Virtualization For Dummies. p.  54.
  3. "How did the term "hypervisor" come into use?".
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  8. See History of CP/CMS for virtual-hardware simulation in the development of the System/370
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  11. Fritsch, Lothar; Husseiki, Rani; Alkassar, Ammar. Complementary and Alternative Technologies to Trusted Computing (TC-Erg./-A.), Part 1, A study on behalf of the German Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) (PDF) (Report). Archived from the original (PDF) on June 7, 2020. Retrieved February 28, 2011.
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  17. Wang, Zhi; Jiang, Xuxian; Cui, Weidong; Ning, Peng (August 11, 2009). "Countering kernel rootkits with lightweight hook protection". Proceedings of the 16th ACM conference on Computer and communications security (PDF). CCS '09. Chicago, Illinois, USA: ACM. pp. 545–554. CiteSeerX   10.1.1.147.9928 . doi:10.1145/1653662.1653728. ISBN   978-1-60558-894-0. S2CID   3006492 . Retrieved November 11, 2009.