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An Overview of Virtualization Technologies

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the an-operating-system-by-any-other-name dept.

PCM2 writes "Virtualization is all the rage these days. All the major Linux players are getting into the game with support for Xen, while Sun has Solaris Containers, Microsoft has Virtual PC, and VMware arguably leads the whole market with its high end tools. Even AMD and Intel are jumping onto the bandwagon. InfoWorld is running a special report on virtualization that gives an overview of all these options and more. Is it just a trend, or will server virtualization be the way to go in the near future?"

2 of 204 comments (clear)

  1. Just a trend? NO WAY by giorgiofr · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Virtualization is one of the best things since sliced bread and I believe it's here to stay. First of all, it spells an end to multi-booting. I have erased my secondary OSs and I run them in VMs under my main system. A performance hit does definitely occur by I am willing to pay such price for the greater ease of use. Secondly, just think of the possibility to move server images from a physical server to another one, literally freezing it here and awakening it over there - InstaScaleOut(tm) must be a server admin's wet dream.
    Of course, as with all abstraction layers, it introduces complexity and takes a toll in the form of performance - but we all know absraction layers have been increasing all the time since the beginning of time.

    --
    Global warming is a cube.
  2. a quote by haupz · · Score: 5, Interesting
    "Virtual machines have finally arrived. Dismissed for a number of years as merely academic curiosities, they are now seen as cost-effective techniques for organizing computer systems resources to provide extraordinary system flexibility and support for certain unique applications."

    Now guess who said that, and when. :-)

    Robert P. Goldberg said that, in 1974.

    The fun thing about this is, it's still a very accurate statement. Other than in 1974, though, it doesn't solely apply to mainframes, but, as someone wrote in an earlier post, to everyday computers: desktop systems. I think that's great, and the above quote is more true than ever. Working on Mac OS X and having a Parallels session up and running where some Java application (for example) is tested in a Windows or what environment... lovely.

    Yes, I'm a virtualisation enthusiast, if you haven't guessed so already. ;-)