You can now run same OCI images as containers or Firecracker microVMs • Hacker News Board

Re: You can now run same OCI images as containers or Firecracker microVMs

#11

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 4:27 PM UTC

spwa4 wrote: post #7

liquid64 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The kernel/initrd come from a regular OCI container image — there's no separate VM image format. Any OCI image containing /boot/vmlinux (and optionally /boot/initramfs.cpio.gz) works as a kernel image.

And if they don't have a kernel? You just specify kernel + initrd?

[deleted]

Re: You can now run same OCI images as containers or Firecracker microVMs

#12

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 4:28 PM UTC

spwa4 wrote: post #7

liquid64 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The kernel/initrd come from a regular OCI container image — there's no separate VM image format. Any OCI image containing /boot/vmlinux (and optionally /boot/initramfs.cpio.gz) works as a kernel image.

And if they don't have a kernel? You just specify kernel + initrd?

[deleted]

Re: You can now run same OCI images as containers or Firecracker microVMs

#13

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 4:32 PM UTC

spwa4 wrote: post #7

liquid64 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The kernel/initrd come from a regular OCI container image — there's no separate VM image format. Any OCI image containing /boot/vmlinux (and optionally /boot/initramfs.cpio.gz) works as a kernel image.

And if they don't have a kernel? You just specify kernel + initrd?

[deleted]

Re: You can now run same OCI images as containers or Firecracker microVMs

#14

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 4:34 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: You can now run same OCI images as containers or Firecracker microVMs

#15

Post by pullrun » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 4:40 PM UTC

spwa4 wrote: post #7

liquid64 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The kernel/initrd come from a regular OCI container image — there's no separate VM image format. Any OCI image containing /boot/vmlinux (and optionally /boot/initramfs.cpio.gz) works as a kernel image.

And if they don't have a kernel? You just specify kernel + initrd?

[flagged]

Re: You can now run same OCI images as containers or Firecracker microVMs

#16

Post by yakimbo90 » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 4:57 PM UTC

spwa4 wrote: post #7

liquid64 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The kernel/initrd come from a regular OCI container image — there's no separate VM image format. Any OCI image containing /boot/vmlinux (and optionally /boot/initramfs.cpio.gz) works as a kernel image.

And if they don't have a kernel? You just specify kernel + initrd?

you don't have to source one manually — pullrun kernel install fetches a kata containers kernel into ~/.pullrun/kernels/vmlinux-. One-time setup, then the daemon auto-discovers it.

Re: You can now run same OCI images as containers or Firecracker microVMs

#17

Post by vaylian » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 5:20 PM UTC

Sweet. I had hoped for someone to make a p2p container registry eventually. There is too much centralization with the current popular registries.

Re: You can now run same OCI images as containers or Firecracker microVMs

#18

Post by thepoet » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 5:21 PM UTC

ranger_danger wrote: post #3

Where does the microvm kernel/initrd come from? How can it be built? I just want a system that's as easy as "docker run ubuntu" but launches as a microvm instead, without me having to source a kernel or remember hugenormously long qemu incantation lines.

We will be soon including this in Tarit, a firecracker alternative https://github.com/instavm/tarit

Currently we have to supply a kernel to run the OCI as a microVM with a warm pool.

  TARIT_KERNEL=/path/vmlinux

  taritd image build --oci ubuntu:24.04 --name ubuntu
  taritd vm create --image ubuntu

Re: You can now run same OCI images as containers or Firecracker microVMs

#19

Post by moondev » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 5:24 PM UTC

yakimbo90 wrote: post #16

spwa4 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And if they don't have a kernel? You just specify kernel + initrd?

you don't have to source one manually — pullrun kernel install fetches a kata containers kernel into ~/.pullrun/kernels/vmlinux- . One-time setup, then the daemon auto-discovers it.

If you run an ubuntu image with a kata kernel, do you have difficulty installing some packages? For example if you need linux-headers-$(uname -r) or linux-modules-extra-$(uname -r), it won't exist in canonical apt repos?

Re: You can now run same OCI images as containers or Firecracker microVMs

#20

Post by jtbaker » Thu, Jul 23, 2026, 5:40 PM UTC

ranger_danger wrote: post #3

Where does the microvm kernel/initrd come from? How can it be built? I just want a system that's as easy as "docker run ubuntu" but launches as a microvm instead, without me having to source a kernel or remember hugenormously long qemu incantation lines.

I think `smolvm` may fit the bill? I've been using it to run pi.dev in a sandbox.

https://smolmachines.com/