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" Parallels is a worldwide leader in virtualization and automation software that optimizes computing for consumers, businesses, and service providers across all major hardware, operating system, and virtualization platforms. "
Source : SWsoft
Your Guide to OS Virtualization
OS Virtualization is also known as :
Server Virtualization,
IT Systems,
Virtualization Software ,
Operating System Technology,
Operating System Security,
Network Virtualization,
Virtualization Development,
Server Virtualization Solution,
Virtualization Platforms,
Virtualization Technology,
Computer Operating Systems,
Operating System Concepts,
Server Operating Systems,
Operating Systems Resources,
Virtualization Monitoring,
Virtualization Storage Solution.
Table of Contents
- Introduction
- IT Overview
- Virtuozzo Overview
- The Complete Server Virtualization Solution
- How is Virtuozzo Different?
- Virtuozzo Performance
- Addressing the Challenges of IT and Conclusion
Introduction
Today's IT organizations are dealing with the consequences of exploding IT infrastructure growth and
complexity. While computing resources continue to increase in power, organizations are unable to fully
utilize them in single application deployments and cannot change computing resource assignments easily
when application or business requirements change. At the root of the problem is uncontrolled server
sprawl, servers provisioned to support a single application. Organizations that implemented hardware
virtualization have unwittingly created a new problem: OS sprawl. While hardware remains a considerable
cost component, software and management continue to be the largest cost considerations. The daily
management and operations functions are daunting, and adding in business continuity requirements, the
costs and complexity are overwhelming. Moreover, few tools provide the management and automation
to ease the burden on IT departments.
In order to address these critical challenges, IT organizations have to ind ways to accomplish the following:
- Improve the lexibility of computing resource assignment
- Decrease complexity to improve manageability of systems
- Automate routine tasks
- Reduce overall management costs through eficiency
- Provide cost-effective data availability and recovery
- Increase the return from their infrastructure investment by better utilizing resources
Operating-system level virtualization and Virtuozzo empower IT organizations to meet these challenges
and the increasing demands on IT infrastructure..
IT Overview
EnTerprise IT TodAy
During the last two decades, enterprises experienced explosive IT
infrastructure growth, both in number of servers and complexity of
conigurations. The typical organization currently has to manage a
complex heterogeneous environment consisting of 100s to 1000s
of Windows, Linux, UNIX and other servers.
Historically, most enterprises have deployed a dedicated server for
each application or department.
The dedicated server model is extremely costly due to:
- Infrastructure and power Costs Housing, cooling, connecting and providing power to servers
can be extremely expensive as servers grow to large numbers, especially as power costs continue
to rise. Server electricity requirements alone can be a large cost component; a rack of servers can
cost $17,000 a year in power.1
- Hardware Cost Every year servers increase in capacity and computing power. As servers become
more powerful it becomes increasingly dificult to maximize utilization of these powerful resources.
IT organizations and application owners have become accustomed to dedicating a server to each
application to ensure complete control over the application. In almost every case, dedicating these
powerful servers results in over provisioning from 50-500%.
- Software Cost Each server requires licenses and support from the OS and application software
vendors.
- Management Cost Management costs are by far the largest, yet most intangible, portion of server
costs; analysts estimate management costs at 50-70% of the total cost of server ownership.2 The
IT staff has to upgrade, patch, back-up and ix hardware and software, provision new servers and
applications, maintain user accounts and perform many other tasks. Often times personnel only
have the skill set to manage a single platform, so the overhead increases even further. With all of
these considerations, IT departments ind it challenging to meet the demands of the associated
server management. In addition to the aforementioned costs, IT organizations today face the following
issues:
- Limited Beneit of Infrastructure Assets There is only so much real estate in the world, and as
organizations try to work within limited or costly data centers, the assets must be fully utilized. The
obvious assets include rack space and servers, but there are several other associated assets to
evaluate including networking equipment and bandwidth, power and even staff resources.
- Manual, Complex and Time Consuming Management Most IT departments support numerous
OSs. Add applications into IT department support requirements and the complexity is overwhelming
just for software. Consider provisioning, patch management, coniguration changes, backup
and audit tasks and it becomes clear why management is the largest cost component of the data
center. Although there are existing tools for many of these, nothing is comprehensive and many are
cost prohibitive.
- Low Flexibility Any change in the existing network can create a service breakdown or outage. An
application may be subjected to an unusual or unexpected processing demand. A hardware issue
may necessitate an upgrade. Moving an application server to different or more powerful hardware involves
signiicant planned downtime and administrative effort. Rather than risk interruptions in service
or frequent application migrations, servers are consistently heavily over-provisioned, greatly decreasing
server utilization and increasing associated costs as more servers are deployed.
- Unacceptable or Uncertain data Availability Data availability guarantees and demands are
becoming a reality for many IT organizations. Managers and planners are expected to be able to
answer the question "What if..". While all data has its relative value, in the past there have only been
very limited offerings for data availability and recovery, either at the very low end of the cost and
recovery time cycle or at the very top. IT organizations need more options for both disaster recovery
and data availability.
Each IT department faced with server sprawl is impacted by common symptoms negatively impacting
the infrastructure. What are the symptoms of these challenges?
- Increasing numbers of under-utilized servers and other assets, both from processing and capacity
perspectives
- Ballooning administrative staff requirements and an inability to stay ahead of workload demands
- Over-provisioned servers, ready for the worst-case workload scenarios
- Slow response time to IT requests including server provisioning and updates
- Incomplete information on hardware and software status and ownership
- No disaster recovery plan for the majority of server and data resources
Most enterprises continue to struggle with the high cost and complexity and low lexibility of IT infrastructure.
Virtualization and automation software can help enterprises solve these critical problems.
Virtuozzo Overview
Virtuozzo is an operating system level server virtualization solution. Virtuozzo creates isolated partitions or
virtual environments (VEs) on a single physical server and OS instance to utilize hardware, software, data
center and management efforts with maximum eficiency.
Virtuozzo's OS virtualization solution
has higher eficiency and manageability,
making it the best solution
for organizations concerned with
containing the IT infrastructure and
maximizing resource utilization.
Virtuozzo's complete set of management
tools and unique architecture
makes it the perfect solution for easily
maintaining, monitoring and managing
virtualized server resources for
consolidation and business continuity
conigurations.
The Virtuozzo low-overhead, eficient architecture maximizes server resources. SWsoft created a portable
layer to existing operating systems which adds a dynamic partition or Virtual Environment (VE) that
resides on a common OS. The single thin Virtuozzo layer introduces only a small percentage of overhead
and allows up to 100s of VEs to run on a physical server. This architecture allows a much more lexible,
eficient and cost-effective solution for server management.
The enhanced design of the virtualization technology also enables any VE on any network to be easily and
transparently moved to another server with near-zero downtime, enabling IT departments to more fully
utilize existing servers and minimize or eliminate planned downtime.
The Complete Server Virtualization Solution
Virtuozzo was designed to enable IT organizations to maximize server resources through a unique virtualization
technology and manage the IT infrastructure easily with an advanced set of administration tools.
In order to meet the virtualization and automation requirements of today's IT departments, a virtualization
solution must provide the following components:
InTELLIGEnT pArTITIOnInG
Intelligent partitioning divides a server into as many as hundreds of VEs with full server functionality. A
VE has its own processes, users, iles, root or administrator access, full networking, system libraries
and everything it needs to appear to be a standalone server. While Virtuozzo uses only a single instance
of an operating system, each VE has links back to the standard operating system. These links can be
represented in a capability in the software called templating, which creates a basic blueprint of an OS or
application. The links make a VE footprint very small, and associated operations very fast. Because of the
low overhead and single operating system required, potentially 100's of VEs may be loaded on a single
physical server. The partitions are also lexible, as they may be changed in real-time without affecting the
VE or its workload.
Complete Isolation
Complete isolation ensures that the VEs are secure and have full functional, fault and performance
isolation.
Isolation is achieved through multiple layers of security designed to ensure that each VE is secure, isolated
and unaffected from other VEs on the same physical server. Virtuozzo's patent-pending technology,
Kernel Service Abstraction Layer (KSAL), mediates activity to the kernel and prevents any single VE from
taking the entire server down. Virtuozzo File System (VZFS) is a proprietary ile system that, ensures that a
user cannot access any other VE or part of the server. Additionally, Virtuozzo has copy-on-write technology,
which makes a local copy of anything unique in the VE. Lastly, the software also ensures performance
isolation with a complete set of resource management capabilities and controls.
Dynamic Resource Allocation
Dynamic resource allocation of key system resources such as CPU, memory, network, disk and I/O
enables near real-time changes without affecting a VE or its workload. Virtuozzo's sophisticated resource
management controls CPU, memory, network I/O, disk space and other system resources. Resources
can be controlled with simple minimums (guarantees), maximums (limits), shares or more sophisticated
allocations that allow for speciied overages. Virtuozzo assigns, monitors, accounts and controls resource
levels in real-time and alerts administrators according to pre-deined criteria. Should adjustments
in resources be required, simply change the resources in real-time without affecting a VE or application
performance. A unique feature of Virtuozzo resource management is the ability to "burst" or allow VEs to
use resources that are currently unused on the server. In this respect, a VE can get at least its guaranteed
resources on the server.
Live Migration
Live Migration and other business continuity capabilities ensure data is available and recoverable. Virtuozzo
virtualization provides separation of the VEs from the physical server hardware; any VE and application
can reside on any x86 hardware. Migrating a VE to another piece of hardware is simple as long as Virtuozzo
is the underlying infrastructure. Virtuozzo moves the VEs and any corresponding application(s) between
any networked servers transparently with almost no downtime. The abstraction from the hardware
also makes the underlying hardware irrelevant, no application testing on different hardware is required.
As VEs begin to multiply, the dependence on a single point of failure - the underlying server -increases.
With Virtuozzo, the underlying OS is always running; therefore, VEs are always accessible and recoverable
through VE owner self-management Virtuozzo Power Panel. Virtualization also allows the migration
of VEs immediately upon threat of a hardware problem. While hardware accounts for only 10% of all
downtime , this can be further minimized by justifying and purchasing a better quality of server with the
higher utilization rate provided by Virtuozzo.
Mass Management
Virtuozzo has a full suite of tools/ templates for automated, multi-VE and multi-server administration.
Virtuozzo complete roles and permissions-based management toolset has three options for the Virtuozzo
administrator: command line, Virtuozzo Management Center (VZMC) and Virtuozzo Control Center
(VZCC). The VZMC manages both Linux and Windows servers from a single GUI interface providing wizards
and an intuitive interface for easy management and monitoring. The VZCC is a web-based interface
for anywhere access without loading software. Capabilities of these tools include conversion, provisioning,
monitoring, backing up, recovering, analyzing, troubleshooting, repairing and migrating VEs. The
command line interface is used heavily by large Virtuozzo shops to automate tasks. Using the interfaces,
the server administrator can eficiently manage, script and monitor 100s of VEs easily.
VE owners/administrators can use the browser-based Virtuozzo Power Panel (VZPP) to start/stop,
backup/restore, repair and remotely reinstall the VE without the Virtuozzo administrator's support. IT administrators
at any skill level can provision multiple VEs at once, move VEs to other physical servers and
start/stop and reboot as many VEs as required. Even better, using the VZPP, VE owners can perform
these same functions without ever requesting the help of IT resources.
The VZMC helps administrators manage multiple servers eficiently. Applications can be deployed and
updated on many servers simultaneously. OS updates and patches can also be managed centrally. The
VZMC provides a centralized look at server information and software versions across all server resources,
facilitating versioning and patch management. Virtuozzo replaces the most popular server resource
management tool- the spreadsheet. Virtuozzo has a well documented API and accessible to other infrastructure
management tools, which see and manage Virtuozzo VEs because VEs operate as standalone
servers.
How is Virtuozzo different?
Hardware virtualization is well-known in the server virtualization market. OS-level virtualization expands
the opportunities for server virtualization and is a complementary or replacement technology in many
organizations.
How does Virtuozzo compare to hardware virtualization technologies such as VMware, Xen, Virtual
Server and Parallels?
Hardware virtualization solutions all have the same premise: resource consolidation. The end goal of the
consolidation is to be able to place many different and separate operating systems on the same server.
Each of these technologies, whether it is a hypervisor or an OS, has an underlying piece of software that
is the basis of the relationship between the hardware and the residing software. Above the hypervisor or
virtual machine monitor level is the virtualized hardware level. In order to assign resources, this type of
technology must virtualize every single piece of hardware, in essence recreating the work of the hardware
vendors and the OS software vendors that already support the hardware. Finally, inside the guest
virtual machines, there is a complete copy of an additional operating system and the residing workloads
or applications.
Hardware virtualization has its beneits. At least on the leading market solution, just about any operating
system is supported. It is possible to load Windows next Linux next to Solaris, and it still supports older
OSs. Despite the beneits, the lexibility of this type of solution comes with a lot of overhead and ineficiencies.
Hardware virtualization has its beneits. At least on the leading market solution, just about any operating
system is supported. It is possible to load Windows next Linux next to Solaris, and it still supports older
OSs. Despite the beneits, the lexibility of this type of solution comes with a lot of overhead and ineficiencies.
Further limitations inherent to hardware virtualization lead to additional overheads and ineficiencies, as
addressed in the following points:
- A single application has two OSs to traverse; the guest-level OS and the hypervisor or host OS.
More processing equates to slower responses and more overhead.
- Each OS takes space in memory, and memory is always the most constrained resource on a server.
While some vendors have taken steps to maximize memory usage, the ineficiencies still exist.
- The duplicate OSs consume hard drive space and must be licensed and managed separately. Because
virtual machines don't need hardware justiication, many IT organizations are now starting to
see OS sprawl instead of server sprawl.
- Hardware support and interoperability for all of the hardware on the market is dificult to emulate well,
so it is often a source of slower response times and higher processing overhead.
As an OS-level virtualization solution, Virtuozzo uses a single standard Operating System on a server.
Not only does this model eliminate the ineficiencies of hardware virtualization, but there are advantages
inherent to this approach:
- Performance
- Virtuozzo uses all of the real hardware and OS software. There are no rewritten drivers or OS
technology. There is also very little or no delay in supporting new technologies and it performs at
near-native server levels.
- There is no duplicate OS, so it again performs very eficiently.
- Because of the near native server performance, Virtuozzo is used to virtualize high I/O applications
such as data bases and email servers.
- Scalability
- The lexible design allows any VE to seamlessly scale to the resources of the entire server.
- The lean architecture ensures that nearly all of the system resources are available for use by VEs.
- Virtuozzo fully supports native 2 bit and 6 bit systems, 16 CPUs SMP support and 6 GB
RAM on the host as well in as in VEs.
- Density
- Because of the single OS, memory and other technology eficiencies, Virtuozzo has the highest
density of any virtualization solution. It is possible to deploy up to 100's of VEs on a regular twoway
x86 server. This high density equates to the fastest ROI of any virtualization solution.
- Manageability
- There is only a single OS to manage, maintain and license. Even if OS vendors forget they are
managing the hardware below rather than the applications above, and change their licensing
models, the management savings will make the extra licensing costs worthwhile.
- Application management may also be centralized and managed as a single instance.
- One update can patch multiple VEs on multiple servers.
- Many operations are automated and scriptable, making management of many servers and VEs
simple.
- OSs and other software can be created in a VE as simple links making the footprint small operations
extremely fast. For example, a VE is created in seconds, and clones or migrations take less
time because only the active or different data is moved rather than an entire operating system.
- The comprehensive resource management ensures that all required resources are provided as
conigured for each VE. It also allows VEs to use available resources and make changes in near
real-time.
Virtuozzo performance
Virtuozzo's unique form of virtualization not only eliminates complications that arise with hardware virtualization,
but its impact on server performance is so minimal that the server operates at near-native levels.
The performance factors include:
- System Calls Virtuozzo has a common kernel, no additional systems calls are created between
excess layers.
- Filesystem Common data is stored only once and is available to multiple environments, signiicantly
improving the eficiency of both the disk space and system memory. The disk space for caching is
also used eficiently, caching payload rather than duplicated data.
- Filesystem performance Virtuozzo's ilesystem and eficient system call design create very small
CPU usage overhead.
- Filesystem buffers/cache in memory Virtuozzo places a single instance of data and cache
across the server, maximizing memory eficiency.
- Memory Management Virtuozzo handles memory allocation requests dynamically. Virtuozzo
environments can use a lot of memory during load peaks, and users will fully beneit from running
Virtuozzo on high-end servers. Applications in Virtuozzo environments can show very high peak performance.
Also, when environment resource demand grows gradually in time, Virtuozzo's dynamic
resource management allows increasing the resource allocation with no downtime.
Addressing the Challenges of IT and Conclusion
IT organizations are tasked with implementing powerful and reliable services at low a cost. Due to exploding
infrastructure growth and complexity, this task has been increasingly dificult until now. Virtuozzo
addresses each of the following critical challenges faced by IT organizations and empowers them to
grow their business while cutting overhead and ineficiencies.
- Improve the lexibility of computing resource assignment- Virtuozzo abstracts software and workloads
from the hardware. It makes all resource assignments changeable in real-time and movement
between hardware seamless.
- Decrease complexity to improve manageability of systems- Templating, single OSs and applications
and other technology advances make management of Virtuozzo VEs and servers much simpler than
regular servers or virtual machines.
- Automate routine tasks- The automation tools and scripts possible with Virtuozzo make managing
VEs across servers simple and potentially a single action.
- Reduce overall management costs through eficiency- Many manageability advances enable much
better and eficient server management.
- Reduce overall management costs through eficiency- Many manageability advances enable much
better and eficient server management.
Virtualization and automation technology is a major advance in enterprise IT infrastructure management.
By leveraging the capability of abstracting software and data from the hardware and treating the hardware
as a pool of resources, virtualization and automation technology is a key enabler for IT organizations.
Virtuozzo is the only virtualization and automation solution that was developed speciically for virtualizing
production servers. Virtuozzo allows enterprises to implement server consolidation, increase manageability
and service levels, and dramatically lower total cost of ownership (TCO).