Porting Xen

Porting Xen

[Dave Feustel]

Is there documentation on porting Xen 2.0
to freebsd that could be modified to document
how to port xen to Openbsd?
(An item checklist would be real handy)

Ditto for Xen running in 64 bit mode.

Will Xen64 support 32-bit operating systems?

Thanks,
Dave Feustel


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Re: Porting Xen

[Kip Macy]

On Tue, 21 Dec 2004, Dave Feustel wrote:

> Is there documentation on porting Xen 2.0
> to freebsd that could be modified to document
> how to port xen to Openbsd?
> (An item checklist would be real handy)

You mean porting FreeBSD to Xen. Not really, but I can come up with
something rudimentary.


> Ditto for Xen running in 64 bit mode.
>
> Will Xen64 support 32-bit operating systems?

Yes. But to run more than 4GB of 32-bit OSes you'll need to have shadow
page tables turned on.

			-Kip









>
> Thanks,
> Dave Feustel
>
>
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Re: Porting Xen

[Luciano Miguel Ferreira Rocha]

On Tue, Dec 21, 2004 at 11:19:28AM -0800, Kip Macy wrote:
> 
> 
> On Tue, 21 Dec 2004, Dave Feustel wrote:
> 
> > Is there documentation on porting Xen 2.0
> > to freebsd that could be modified to document
> > how to port xen to Openbsd?
> > (An item checklist would be real handy)
> 
> You mean porting FreeBSD to Xen. Not really, but I can come up with
> something rudimentary.
> 

I'd like to help porting Xen (or finish porting) to x86_64 and ppc. Can
somebody point me in the right direction?

Regards,
Luciano Rocha


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Re: Porting Xen

[Dave Feustel]

On Tuesday 21 December 2004 02:19 pm, Kip Macy wrote:
> 
> On Tue, 21 Dec 2004, Dave Feustel wrote:
> 
> > Is there documentation on porting Xen 2.0
> > to freebsd that could be modified to document
> > how to port xen to Openbsd?
> > (An item checklist would be real handy)
> 
> You mean porting FreeBSD to Xen. Not really, but I can come up with
> something rudimentary.

It would help me if you did. I would like to port Openbsd to run on Xen, but
I think I would need some direction to even attempt to do this.

> > Ditto for Xen running in 64 bit mode.
> >
> > Will Xen64 support 32-bit operating systems?
> 
> Yes. But to run more than 4GB of 32-bit OSes you'll need to have shadow
> page tables turned on.
> 
> 			-Kip
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Dave Feustel
> >
> >
> > -------------------------------------------------------
> > SF email is sponsored by - The IT Product Guide
> > Read honest & candid reviews on hundreds of IT Products from real users.
> > Discover which products truly live up to the hype. Start reading now.
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> > _______________________________________________
> > Xen-devel mailing list
> > Xen-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xen-devel
> >
> 
> 
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> _______________________________________________
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> Xen-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xen-devel
> 


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RE: Porting Xen

[Ian Pratt]

 
> Is there documentation on porting Xen 2.0 to freebsd that 
> could be modified to document how to port xen to Openbsd?
> (An item checklist would be real handy)

Is OpenBSD closer to FreeBSD than NetBSD?
Maybe Kip Macy can supply a change list of what he had to do for
FreeBSD. Things may be slightly easier now the "writeable pagetable"
interface is available (the Linux 2.6 port uses this).  

> Ditto for Xen running in 64 bit mode.

x86_64 port is still work in progress.

> Will Xen64 support 32-bit operating systems?

Doesn't seem much point running 32 bit paravirtualized guests (it will
still run 32 bit user space), and it makes life easier not to. However,
there are plans to run 32 and 64  bit unmodified guests on a 64 bit
hypervisor (as well as 64bit paravirtualized guests) using Intel VT
extensions.

Ian 


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RE: Porting Xen

[Kip Macy]

>
> Is OpenBSD closer to FreeBSD than NetBSD?

It is a fork of NetBSD, but the FreeBSD port was completed more
recently.



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Re: Porting Xen

[David Hopwood]

Ian Pratt wrote:
> Doesn't seem much point running 32 bit paravirtualized guests (it will
> still run 32 bit user space), and it makes life easier not to. However,
> there are plans to run 32 and 64  bit unmodified guests on a 64 bit
> hypervisor (as well as 64bit paravirtualized guests) using Intel VT
> extensions.

Aha: <http://www.intel.com/research/print/cambridge_collab.pdf>

I was wondering how the Xen developers could be so confident that VT
would be sufficient to run Windows under Xen, given that no details
of VT have been announced publically; this explains it.

-- 
David Hopwood <david.nospam.hopwood@blueyonder.co.uk>



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RE: Porting Xen

[Ian Pratt]

> once it has full hardware support, it won't be  
> paravirtualization anymore, will be?

Using the new hardware support Xen will have the capability to run
unmodified guests, but where possible you'll still want to use
paravirtualized guests as they'll offer better performance and benefit
from being aware of the virtualized environment. 

Ian


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Re: Porting Xen

[Adam Sulmicki]

>> Doesn't seem much point running 32 bit paravirtualized guests (it will
>> still run 32 bit user space), and it makes life easier not to. However,
>> there are plans to run 32 and 64  bit unmodified guests on a 64 bit
>> hypervisor (as well as 64bit paravirtualized guests) using Intel VT
>> extensions.
>
> Aha: <http://www.intel.com/research/print/cambridge_collab.pdf>
>
> I was wondering how the Xen developers could be so confident that VT
> would be sufficient to run Windows under Xen, given that no details
> of VT have been announced publically; this explains it.

once it has full hardware support, it won't be  paravirtualization 
anymore, will be?


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Re: Porting Xen

[Dave Feustel]

On Wednesday 22 December 2004 12:01 am, Ian Pratt wrote:
> > once it has full hardware support, it won't be  
> > paravirtualization anymore, will be?
> 
> Using the new hardware support Xen will have the capability to run
> unmodified guests, but where possible you'll still want to use
> paravirtualized guests as they'll offer better performance and benefit
> from being aware of the virtualized environment. 
> 
> Ian

This looks very promising!
When will chips with the new hardware support become available?

Dave Feustel


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Re: Porting Xen

[Keir Fraser]

> On Wednesday 22 December 2004 12:01 am, Ian Pratt wrote:
> > > once it has full hardware support, it won't be  
> > > paravirtualization anymore, will be?
> > 
> > Using the new hardware support Xen will have the capability to run
> > unmodified guests, but where possible you'll still want to use
> > paravirtualized guests as they'll offer better performance and benefit
> > from being aware of the virtualized environment. 
> > 
> > Ian
> 
> This looks very promising!
> When will chips with the new hardware support become available?

Intel haven't yet announced when they will ship VT-capable chips.

 -- Keir


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Re: Porting Xen

[Dave Feustel]

On Wednesday 22 December 2004 12:01 am, Ian Pratt wrote:
> > once it has full hardware support, it won't be  
> > paravirtualization anymore, will be?
> 
> Using the new hardware support Xen will have the capability to run
> unmodified guests, but where possible you'll still want to use
> paravirtualized guests as they'll offer better performance and benefit
> from being aware of the virtualized environment. 
> 
> Ian

Will Xen itself be virtualizable (ie run under Xen) with the VT technolgy?

Thanks,
Dave Feustel


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Re: Porting Xen

[Keir Fraser]

> On Wednesday 22 December 2004 12:01 am, Ian Pratt wrote:
> > > once it has full hardware support, it won't be  
> > > paravirtualization anymore, will be?
> > 
> > Using the new hardware support Xen will have the capability to run
> > unmodified guests, but where possible you'll still want to use
> > paravirtualized guests as they'll offer better performance and benefit
> > from being aware of the virtualized environment. 
> > 
> > Ian
> 
> Will Xen itself be virtualizable (ie run under Xen) with the VT technolgy?

Non-VT Xen will run under VT Xen. Whether VT Xen will run under VT Xen
(allowing arbitrary recursive virtualisation) will depend on whether
VT itself supports this recursion.

 -- Keir


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Re: Porting Xen

[David Hopwood]

Keir Fraser wrote:
>>On Wednesday 22 December 2004 12:01 am, Ian Pratt wrote:
>>
>>>>once it has full hardware support, it won't be  
>>>>paravirtualization anymore, will be?
>>>
>>>Using the new hardware support Xen will have the capability to run
>>>unmodified guests, but where possible you'll still want to use
>>>paravirtualized guests as they'll offer better performance and benefit
>>>from being aware of the virtualized environment. 
>>
>>This looks very promising!
>>When will chips with the new hardware support become available?
> 
> Intel haven't yet announced when they will ship VT-capable chips.

<http://www.intel.com/pressroom/archive/speeches/otellini20040907.htm> says:

# In terms of other technologies, LaGrande Technology for reliability -- for
# security and Vanderpool technology, which is our virtualization capability
# for reliability, the combination those of two really gets enabled with
# [Windows] Longhorn in 2006, even though we have continued to develop it,
# you'll see a demo of it in a few seconds, this technology, in order to be
# mainstreamed, needs a robust, reliable operating system environment that
# we believe will be coincident with the Longhorn deployment in '06.

Also see <http://www.intel.com/update/issue/tim1204.pdf>:

# VT for Intel(R) Xeon(TM) and Pentium(R) 4 processor-based platforms will
# be available on server, workstation, and desktop platforms in 2006.

(This PDF may crash web browsers; save it and open it separately in a
PDF reader.)

-- 
David Hopwood <david.nospam.hopwood@blueyonder.co.uk>



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Re: Porting Xen

[David Rhodus]

On Tue, 21 Dec 2004 19:50:08 -0800 (PST), Kip Macy <kmacy@fsmware.com> wrote:
> >
> > Is OpenBSD closer to FreeBSD than NetBSD?
> 
> It is a fork of NetBSD, but the FreeBSD port was completed more
> recently.
> 

Is the code from the port going to be made public available ?
-- 
                                            -David
                                            Steven David Rhodus
                                            <drhodus@machdep.com>


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Re: Porting Xen

[Kip Macy]

It has already been posted. It will be pushed into FreeBSD cvs as well
as the xen bitkeeper archive.



			-Kip


On Wed, 22 Dec 2004, David Rhodus wrote:

> On Tue, 21 Dec 2004 19:50:08 -0800 (PST), Kip Macy <kmacy@fsmware.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > Is OpenBSD closer to FreeBSD than NetBSD?
> >
> > It is a fork of NetBSD, but the FreeBSD port was completed more
> > recently.
> >
>
> Is the code from the port going to be made public available ?
> --
>                                             -David
>                                             Steven David Rhodus
>                                             <drhodus@machdep.com>
>
>
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Porting Xen...

[Carl Holtje ;021;vcsg6;]

All-

I'm wondering if there is a guide or a general Getting Started for porting
Xen to different architectures. I'm interested in supporting the arm
platform.

Any help or direction is greatly appreciated...

Thanks!

Carl

- --

"There are 10 types of people in the world: Those who understand binary
and those that don't."


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Re: Porting Xen...

[aq]

On Tue, 4 Jan 2005 12:35:52 -0500 (EST), Carl Holtje ;021;vcsg6;
<cwh0803@cs.rit.edu> wrote:
> All-
> 
> I'm wondering if there is a guide or a general Getting Started for porting
> Xen to different architectures. I'm interested in supporting the arm
> platform.

as far as I know, there is no such document (the Xen developers too
lazy ;-)). but you can find some hints from the Developer manual.

besides, i have seen this page, and the experience of the author might
be useful for you: http://www.o3one.org/xen.html

regards,
AQ


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Re: Porting Xen...

[Mark Williamson]

The Xen developer manual provides an overview but I'm afraid it's a case of 
Use The Source Luke when it comes to specifics ;-)

If you get stuck on anything, folks on the mailing list can usually help.

Cheers,
Mark

On Wednesday 05 January 2005 14:18, aq wrote:
> On Tue, 4 Jan 2005 12:35:52 -0500 (EST), Carl Holtje ;021;vcsg6;
>
> <cwh0803@cs.rit.edu> wrote:
> > All-
> >
> > I'm wondering if there is a guide or a general Getting Started for
> > porting Xen to different architectures. I'm interested in supporting the
> > arm platform.
>
> as far as I know, there is no such document (the Xen developers too
> lazy ;-)). but you can find some hints from the Developer manual.
>
> besides, i have seen this page, and the experience of the author might
> be useful for you: http://www.o3one.org/xen.html
>
> regards,
> AQ
>
>
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> Xen-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/xen-devel


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Re: Porting Xen...

[Dan Magenheimer]

> I'm wondering if there is a guide or a general Getting Started for porting
> Xen to different architectures. I'm interested in supporting the arm
> platform.
> 
> Any help or direction is greatly appreciated...

Speaking from experience, I can tell you that porting to a new
architecture is not a small effort.  It is more akin to porting
an operating system than porting an application.  Most of the
code in Xen (x86) is architecture-dependent and, though much of
Xen code is usable for x86_64, it wasn't for ia64 and I'd imagine
arm is very different as well.  Although I was
able to leverage much arch-dep code from Linux/ia64, there
was quite a bit of additional work to handle virtual machine
stuff that is not done by Linux.  Debugging can also be very
difficult unless you have good low-level tools.  (I used a
nice architectural simulator.)  Xen/ia64 has already taken
six months of my time and it is not done.

Is arm fully virtualizable?  Are there any other known VMMs that
run on arm?  If the answer to these is YES, then it might be
easier.

All that said, if you are still interested, I'd be happy to
chat about the Xen/ia64 effort and provide more detail that
might be helpful.

Dan



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