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Wrong. You can script setup of the entire solution, ujt the exact methods may differ (depending on how you deploy the manager, as a VM or stand-alone server, and previously also whether you installed the nodes from image or on top of RHEL (answer file or kickstart).

Key part bolded. Again, (and this is based on a very cursory viewing of the admin docs) this isn't provided by them. You have to write your own scripts and set up your own automation. That means you now have to learn to manage and use not only oVirt, but Ansible and other tools as well.

It's a bit hidden (but hinted at) in the RHV documentation (but the options are in the engine-setup --help, and it always tells you it is writing answer files). See this page which has a section on answer files.

Ansible is an additional option for shops that already have it, not required for scripting installation.

Okay, fair enough. Enterprises with elaborate VMWare setups are going to already have the resources to set something like oVirt up.

Anyone who hasn't got the resources to run a hyper-converged (IOW, software-defined storage cluster on the same hosts that run VMs, instead of expensive storage appliances that have sufficient redundancy to not be a SPOF) on either VMWare or RHEV or oVirt should probably just run in public cloud, it will probably work out cheaper for the same breadth of tooling.

Xen supports para-virtualization, which was built into the original GPL version of Xen and remains useful to approach "bare-metal" speed for the virtual machines.

No, para-virtualisation is no longer useful. PV is dead, kiilled by Spectre.

Much of the need for this has been reduced through the development of "docker", which can be treated much like a Xen based para-virtualized VM with instances of even lighter weight.

WHAT???? You can't compare PV with docker (no virtualisation, just process containment via namespaces). HV with accelerated IO drivers has displaced PV.

The very active CentOS Xen community has, as I've observed, been much larger and much more active than KVM in dealing with new server and guest environments.

What???? That might seem to be the case because very few people use Xen, so the CentOS Xen community it the only place there is any open-source concerted effort around Xen. But, that is because all the concerted open-source virtualisation effort is happening on Linux/KVM.

My information may be out of date: this may also just mean KVM worked well since then. But I've seen a number of clients simply give up on KVM and just switch to Xen or Citrix Xen. due to unexpected limitations and the time necessary to spend valuable engineering time tuning their own virtualization servers. It's no longer on my recommended product list.

KVM isn't a full virtualisation solution, in the same way that Xen (not XenServer) is not a full virtualisation solution. It is just the hypervisor. There are a number of full virtualisation solutions that either support KVM only, or where KVM is the first-class hypervisor, namely:
- oVirt, or if you want, the commercially supported version from Red Hat, called Red Hat Virtualisation
- Openstack
- Proxmox
- many more

If you were ever punting KVM stand-alone, you've done it a dis-service.

Indeed, for small environments, VirtualBox has proven much better due to its cross-platform services for the virtual servers and its ties to Vagrant testing tools. I'd be very surprised to see another new virtualization toolkit enter the already crowded market.

For most of the uses of vagrant (mainly used for developers to spin up dev VMs on their own machine), docker *is* probably a better tool, but Virtualbox is really not a solution for server virtualisation at all, there are so many better open-source solutions available that are community-owned (not owned by Oracle).

XenServer has a full set of tools and a comprehensive GUI for doing anything and everything with the host and VMs. And this is the free version. The Paid version is very generously priced and provides a few more really nice features.

The last time I tried using KVM, there wasn't a single decent management app for KVM that didn't also cost an absurd amount of money and still couldn't do everything that XenCenter/XenServer could do without extreme fiddling. Whether that's still the the case, I'm not sure.

When was that? 4+ years ago? oVirt, the open-source project that Red Hat Virtualisation is built on, supports all the features (and many many more) that (than) XenServer has in the paid version. In fact, it has all the features that RHV has, except the branding and commercial support.

oVirt has been viable as a complete open-source solution since about the 3.3 release which was in Sept 2013. 3.0 was the first release to ditch the old .Net-based UI that came from Qumranet that was still shipped in RHEV 2.x.

XenServer has a full set of tools and a comprehensive GUI for doing anything and everything with the host and VMs. And this is the free version. The Paid version is very generously priced and provides a few more really nice features.

The last time I tried using KVM, there wasn't a single decent management app for KVM that didn't also cost an absurd amount of money and still couldn't do everything that XenCenter/XenServer could do without extreme fiddling. Whether that's still the the case, I'm not sure.

When was that? 4+ years ago? oVirt, the open-source project that Red Hat Virtualisation is built on, supports all the features (and many many more) that (than) XenServer has in the paid version. In fact, it has all the features that RHV has, except the branding and commercial support.

oVirt has been viable as a complete open-source solution since about the 3.3 release which was in Sept 2013. 3.0 was the first release to ditch the old .Net-based UI that came from Qumranet that was still shipped in RHEV 2.x.

Disclaimer: I work for these guys: http://www.ovirt.org/Features/DRBD

As somebody said before, this shop sounds like a fragile thing if some of those people leave. If customers depend on it, it might be advisable to switch to standardized tools for managing KVM environments. oVirt is the upstream project to Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization, i.e. those guys who really know KVM.

http://www.ovirt.org/OVirt_3.0_Feature_Guide

oVirt has pretty much everything he could ever dream of - and it is well documented, so any successor will immediately be able to handle the environment. Of course Open Source, it has a very active community with real experts:

http://www.ovirt.org/Documentation

Can't think of any reason no to use oVirt. It the exact feature set the OP is looking for, addressing his specific needs:

"Having a minimal CLI console available can make the product more attractive to users who use the command line and prefer to avoid using the GUI. It can also provide a simple and fast shell that requires no special client besides an ssh client, without having to connect to the actual VM. Serial console access can also be used for VM troubleshooting at the lower level."

Here you are:
http://www.ovirt.org/Features/Serial_Console_in_CLI

Also, oVirt has a very active community:
http://lists.ovirt.org/pipermail/users/

Take a look, it's free...

Disclaimer: I work for these guys: http://www.ovirt.org/Features/DRBD

As somebody said before, this shop sounds like a fragile thing if some of those people leave. If customers depend on it, it might be advisable to switch to standardized tools for managing KVM environments. oVirt is the upstream project to Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization, i.e. those guys who really know KVM.

http://www.ovirt.org/OVirt_3.0_Feature_Guide

oVirt has pretty much everything he could ever dream of - and it is well documented, so any successor will immediately be able to handle the environment. Of course Open Source, it has a very active community with real experts:

http://www.ovirt.org/Documentation

Can't think of any reason no to use oVirt. It the exact feature set the OP is looking for, addressing his specific needs:

"Having a minimal CLI console available can make the product more attractive to users who use the command line and prefer to avoid using the GUI. It can also provide a simple and fast shell that requires no special client besides an ssh client, without having to connect to the actual VM. Serial console access can also be used for VM troubleshooting at the lower level."

Here you are:
http://www.ovirt.org/Features/Serial_Console_in_CLI

Also, oVirt has a very active community:
http://lists.ovirt.org/pipermail/users/

Take a look, it's free...

Disclaimer: I work for these guys: http://www.ovirt.org/Features/DRBD

As somebody said before, this shop sounds like a fragile thing if some of those people leave. If customers depend on it, it might be advisable to switch to standardized tools for managing KVM environments. oVirt is the upstream project to Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization, i.e. those guys who really know KVM.

http://www.ovirt.org/OVirt_3.0_Feature_Guide

oVirt has pretty much everything he could ever dream of - and it is well documented, so any successor will immediately be able to handle the environment. Of course Open Source, it has a very active community with real experts:

http://www.ovirt.org/Documentation

Can't think of any reason no to use oVirt. It the exact feature set the OP is looking for, addressing his specific needs:

"Having a minimal CLI console available can make the product more attractive to users who use the command line and prefer to avoid using the GUI. It can also provide a simple and fast shell that requires no special client besides an ssh client, without having to connect to the actual VM. Serial console access can also be used for VM troubleshooting at the lower level."

Here you are:
http://www.ovirt.org/Features/Serial_Console_in_CLI

Also, oVirt has a very active community:
http://lists.ovirt.org/pipermail/users/

Take a look, it's free...

Disclaimer: I work for these guys: http://www.ovirt.org/Features/DRBD

As somebody said before, this shop sounds like a fragile thing if some of those people leave. If customers depend on it, it might be advisable to switch to standardized tools for managing KVM environments. oVirt is the upstream project to Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization, i.e. those guys who really know KVM.

http://www.ovirt.org/OVirt_3.0_Feature_Guide

oVirt has pretty much everything he could ever dream of - and it is well documented, so any successor will immediately be able to handle the environment. Of course Open Source, it has a very active community with real experts:

http://www.ovirt.org/Documentation

Can't think of any reason no to use oVirt. It the exact feature set the OP is looking for, addressing his specific needs:

"Having a minimal CLI console available can make the product more attractive to users who use the command line and prefer to avoid using the GUI. It can also provide a simple and fast shell that requires no special client besides an ssh client, without having to connect to the actual VM. Serial console access can also be used for VM troubleshooting at the lower level."

Here you are:
http://www.ovirt.org/Features/Serial_Console_in_CLI

Also, oVirt has a very active community:
http://lists.ovirt.org/pipermail/users/

Take a look, it's free...

Disclaimer: I work for these guys: http://www.ovirt.org/Features/DRBD

As somebody said before, this shop sounds like a fragile thing if some of those people leave. If customers depend on it, it might be advisable to switch to standardized tools for managing KVM environments. oVirt is the upstream project to Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization, i.e. those guys who really know KVM.

http://www.ovirt.org/OVirt_3.0_Feature_Guide

oVirt has pretty much everything he could ever dream of - and it is well documented, so any successor will immediately be able to handle the environment. Of course Open Source, it has a very active community with real experts:

http://www.ovirt.org/Documentation

Can't think of any reason no to use oVirt. It the exact feature set the OP is looking for, addressing his specific needs:

"Having a minimal CLI console available can make the product more attractive to users who use the command line and prefer to avoid using the GUI. It can also provide a simple and fast shell that requires no special client besides an ssh client, without having to connect to the actual VM. Serial console access can also be used for VM troubleshooting at the lower level."

Here you are:
http://www.ovirt.org/Features/Serial_Console_in_CLI

Also, oVirt has a very active community:
http://lists.ovirt.org/pipermail/users/

Take a look, it's free...

I thought RedHat was throwing its weight behind oVirt. OpenStack from the beginning has been very cobbled together and even still is a major pain to set up from scratch. Although oVirt hasn't been around as long, it definitely has a more mature interface as far as I'm concerned. It was my understanding that RedHat was the major player behind oVirt and was looking to make it their cloud platform of choice.

Depending on your equipment and the time you want to spend, oVirt might be an answer.

Although it is still fairly new and is in development, it runs on CentOS6, is free, can handle multiple guest OSes, can create VM's from a template, and has a power users portal page where trusted students/employees can create their own VM from supplied templates. This way, no student would have access to the host OS, but could create a VM as needed. The downside is that it can get quite complicated to set up the system, and could take a bit of time to learn and set it up properly. Since it is free, you are also dependent upon community support.

You can access more info here.

If you want KVM with the manageability of VMWare, then oVirt is what you're looking for. Fee as well, open source and RedHat is investing heavily in it as they base their RedHat Enterprise Virtualization Manager product on it.

http://www.ovirt.org/

the results of the conferencing going on right now for oVirt.

What about incentives like Niftyname, an opensource HaaS system made by a French ISP? Or oVirt, the virtualization system from RedHat? Given how the "cloud" is ready today, I'd say those things are far from being late.. Maybe they need more attention?

(Blatant plug, but it's all open source software so what the heck ...)

Don't forget Red Hat's KVM. Been part of the Linux kernel for about 2 years, and now supports pretty well all the "enterprisy" virtualization features you could need.

And Red Hat are developing a nice GUI management interface which scales to managing 1000s of nodes.

Rich.

Red Hat is now pushing KVM, see http://ovirt.org/