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The new hypervisor LXD

ubuntu.com

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Re: The new hypervisor LXD

#2
Sounds like the right mixture of security and usage (cmdline tools like in Docker) and LXC. Does anybody have any recommendations on how to manage LXC before LXD? LXD can't be the first approach to make usage of LXC and manage connections easy. Played with LXC, liked the concept and hated the iptables NAT thing... not really user friendly. So kudos to LXD!

Re: The new hypervisor LXD

#3
Is it me or is Ubuntu kind of like the Sony of server software? It always seems like they are developing concurrent solutions to fit into their model of doing things.

Where Sony pushes their own special formats like Memory Stick, Ubuntu pushes Upstart, Juju and now LXD. I think in the end this isn't entirely helpful to the ecosystem as a whole when you have Ubuntu attempting to push their special formats of things while not bringing all that much more to the table. The question of how systemd compares to upstart might be something to consider with my upstart comparison, but essentially all I see from Ubuntu is pushing their brand of tooling and most of it is very Ubuntu specific.

On the other hand RedHat usually releases software that can (and usually does) make it to other distributions and ecosystems. I'm not entirely sure what LXD is going to bring to the table beyond what Docker or similar utilities offer, and like many Ubuntu projects it currently seems to be VERY light on documentation. Actually, where do I even access the documentation for this project? Oversights like this are what killed Juju or MAAS for me and yet Ubuntu pushes those projects like crazy at every conference I've seen them at (Gophercon for instance).

Re: The new hypervisor LXD

#4
post #3

Is it me or is Ubuntu kind of like the Sony of server software? It always seems like they are developing concurrent solutions to fit into their model of doing things. Where Sony pushes their own special formats like Memory Stick, Ubuntu pushes Upstart, Juju and now LXD. I think in the end this isn't entirely helpful to the ecosystem as a whole when you have Ubuntu attempting to push their special formats of things wh…

Upstart predates systemd by 4 years and had made it into a good number of other distros before systemd took over. Apart from upstart, I see your point.

Re: The new hypervisor LXD

#5
post #3

Is it me or is Ubuntu kind of like the Sony of server software? It always seems like they are developing concurrent solutions to fit into their model of doing things. Where Sony pushes their own special formats like Memory Stick, Ubuntu pushes Upstart, Juju and now LXD. I think in the end this isn't entirely helpful to the ecosystem as a whole when you have Ubuntu attempting to push their special formats of things wh…

Upstart seems like an odd example to give, given that it was the first sysvinit alternative that actually made it into major distributions. RHEL 6 (thus CentOS 6), ChromeOS and some of the earlier Fedora versions make use of it. This was after an attempt to port launchd failed, because of licensing issues. systemd came several years later.

Red Hat is a different business model. Their venturing into the cloud is more recent. Historically, they've been more into the support business, and this necessitated having a lot of people fix bugs in the Linux ecosystem. That and their acquisition of Cygnus Solutions means they're the de facto gatekeepers of the Linux kernel and much of userspace.

Canonical is a more Apple-like company. They care about being internally consistent and formulating their own brand, interacting with the outside only where necessary.

Re: The new hypervisor LXD

#6
> The new hypervisor isn’t a hypervisor

> And it’s going to be a real hypervisor?

> Yes. We’re working with silicon companies to ensure hardware-assisted security and isolation for these containers, just like virtual machines today. We’re working to ensure that the kernel security cross-section for individual containers can be tightened up for each specific workload.

Sorry, but WTF? Is it a hypervisor or not? From a security perspective, one kernel per container or LXC? If the latter, as the rest of the announcement seems to imply, what is the "work with silicon companies" about? Either compromising Linux allows you to get access to other containers on the machine, or it doesn't. It can't be both.

Re: The new hypervisor LXD

#7
What? My first thought was "cool, Ubuntu backs LXC". My second was "waitaminute, Ubuntu actually wants to compete with Docker?". Docker, as you all know, is a farily well established LXC management solution.

They then go on to state that LXC is a "real hypervisor" with live migrations and such. What? Did they take an established Linux household name, with wikipedia article and everything, and name their new semi-related project identically?

And if it's a para-virtualized solution they're pushing, are they really competing against Xen? I'm not sure it's wiser than competing with Docker.

Anyone from Canonical here and can explain what's going on?

Re: The new hypervisor LXD

#8
post #3

Is it me or is Ubuntu kind of like the Sony of server software? It always seems like they are developing concurrent solutions to fit into their model of doing things. Where Sony pushes their own special formats like Memory Stick, Ubuntu pushes Upstart, Juju and now LXD. I think in the end this isn't entirely helpful to the ecosystem as a whole when you have Ubuntu attempting to push their special formats of things wh…

Upstart seems like an odd example to give, given that it was the first sysvinit alternative that actually made it into major distributions. RHEL 6 (thus CentOS 6), ChromeOS and some of the earlier Fedora versions make use of it. This was after an attempt to port launchd failed, because of licensing issues. systemd came several years later. Red Hat is a different business model. Their venturing into the cloud is more…

Well I'm aware it made it into CentOS but that was kind of short lived and was never updated to newer releases of the codebase (thus making it kind of a init system floating around in limbo with compatibility issues.. many of which I've personally encountered). I understand what you're saying about RedHat vs Canonical, but tooling that is as critical as a containerization or init system don't work very well (IMHO) in a vacuum. You have to have it more widely available, useable and used by the community or not only can you not build community, but you end up creating a fractured ecosystem that makes it hard to tool for among other things.

Re: The new hypervisor LXD

#10
I'd like to read up on the technical docs. At first, it looks like a Docker rival. One of the concerns I have about LXC is that it isn't using hardware paravirtualization. It seems like that is what Ubuntu is trying to do with LXD (that is, LXD provides a hypervisor backend for LXC), but I am not sure. If this, then that's a much more compelling argument for me to use LXC over something like VirtualBox or ESX, or whatever.

Then again, maybe I don't understand how LXC work at all.

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