Operating System Virtualization – Types, Working, Benefits

OS virtualization is an innovative generation that has changed how we manage and utilize our computational resources. Virtualization isn't always a new term in the tech enterprise; it has been around for many years, but it maintains to evolve and bring about revolutionary answers. But what precisely is operating system virtualization? How does it feature, and extra importantly, what forms of virtualization exist, and what benefits do they provide? This blog will provide you all the information about the Operating System virtualization along with AWS Solution Architect syllabus.

What is Operating System Virtualization?

At its center, running device virtualization is a technological approach that lets in a single physical hardware machine to run multiple virtual environments. These environments, referred to as virtual machines (VMs), include the entire working system (OS) that runs as though it has been a separate laptop altogether. But in truth, those VMs are all sharing the same underlying hardware resources.

You would possibly think of virtualization in operating system as a form of mimicry or illusion. Here is an easy way to visualize it: imagine a collection of actors (the VMs) acting specific roles at the same level (the bodily hardware). Each actor makes use of the same level; however, they may all be acting one-of-a-kind scripts (distinct operating structures).

Uses of Operating System Virtualization?

The cloud's main attraction is the ability to access vast computing resources on-demand, and operating system virtualization plays a pivotal role in making this happen. There is multiple Cloud Courses online to enhance your skills on Virtualization and ace the AWS Solutions Architect exam.

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS): IaaS is one of the cloud services providing operating system virtualization in cloud computing. IaaS offers virtual machines to their clients, who can run their own applications on these VMs without worrying about hardware maintenance or updates.

Multi-Tenancy: Virtualization enables features to use the same physical server's resources by multiple users simultaneously, without interfering with each other. This feature allows cloud service providers to serve many clients on the same physical server with better utilization of resources and lower costs.

Scalability and Flexibility: Cloud computing is elastic computing with the ability to scale resources up or down based on demand. Operating system virtualization enables this scalability. If a business needs more resources, more virtual machines can be created, or existing ones can be allocated more power. If the demand decreases, resources can be scaled back.

Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity: Cloud-based disaster recovery solutions often leverage virtualization. By creating a virtual replica of a physical system, businesses can quickly switch to the replica if a disaster strikes, minimizing downtime.

Software Development and Testing: Virtualization provides developers to create multiple virtual machines using different operating systems and configurations for application development and testing. 

In summary, virtualization in operating systems is a cornerstone of cloud computing, enabling IaaS models, multi-tenancy, flexible resource allocation, efficient disaster recovery solutions, and versatile environments for software testing.

How Operating System Virtualization Works?

The process involves a combination of software and hardware elements working together in a specific way. Let's dive into the process:

The Hypervisor is a key component in OS virtualization. The hypervisor is a software layer placed between hardware and operating systems of virtual machines. Its role is to manage and partition the system's resources so that each VM gets what it needs to function.

Creating Virtual Machines: Once the hypervisor is installed and configured, we can start creating virtual machines. Each VM functions as a self-contained system with its own operating system and applications. 

Resource Allocation: It ensures all configured VM gets its share of hardware resources like CPU, memory, storage, etc. It does this by partitioning the physical resources and assigning them to each VM per its requirements.

Managing VMs: The hypervisor continuously monitors the VMs to ensure they are functioning correctly. It manages the startup and shutdown of VMs, monitors their resource usage, and reallocates resources when necessary.

Interacting with VMs: Users can interact with VMs just like they having a physical computer. They can run applications, change system settings, and even reboot the system if necessary.

Isolation: The hypervisor ensures isolation among the VMs, meaning that each VM is unaware of the others. This is crucial for security and stability. If one VM crashes or gets infected by a virus, the others remain unaffected.

To sum it up, OS virtualization is just creating and managing multiple independent computing system on a single physical system. 

Types of OS Virtualization

While the fundamental principles of virtualization in operating system remain consistent, its implementation can vary. The two most common types of OS Virtualization are here that offer extensive support for virtualization are Linux and Windows.

Linux Operating System virtualization

Linux supports several OS virtualization types and technologies. Two of the most notable are Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) and containerization.

KVM: This is a full virtualization solution for Linux on x86 hardware containing virtualization extensions. It turns the Linux kernel into a hypervisor, allowing the host machine to run multiple, isolated virtual environments called guests or Virtual Machines (VMs). Each VM has private virtualized hardware, including a network card, disk, graphics adapter, etc., and they run independently of one another.

Containerization (e.g., Docker, LXC): Containers are a lighter form of virtualization. Instead of emulating the entire operating system, containerization allows multiple isolated user-space instances (containers) to run on a single system without the overhead of simulating hardware or a full-fledged OS.

Windows Operating System Virtualizations

Windows also provides robust virtualization features through Hyper-V, which is available in Windows Server and some versions of Windows 10 and later.

Hyper-V: This is a hardware virtualization product that allows users to create and run a software version of a computer, called a virtual machine. Each virtual machine behaves like a complete computer, running an operating system and programs. Hyper-V creates a virtual layer between the hardware of the host computer and the virtual machine, effectively partitioning the system resources.

VMware Workstation Player Operating System: VMware Workstation Player is a virtualization software that allows users to run multiple operating systems on a single physical computer. It supports a wide range of operating systems as both host and guest systems.

Here, you can get several another operating system virtualization examples by using technologies like Docker, Kubernetes, LXC/LXD, OpenVZ, FreeBSD Jail, Openstack etc.

Operating system virtualization offers a host of benefits, no matter which type of OS virtualization you use. We'll take a look at those in the next section.

Types of Disks in OS Virtualization

When it comes to virtualization in operating system, how data storage is managed plays a critical role. Mainly, there are two types of disks that VMs use: private disks and shared disks. Let's look into both:

Private Disk

As the name suggests, a private disk is exclusive to a single VM. The VM has complete control over the disk, and no other VM can access or modify the data on it. In essence, a private disk functions like a physical hard drive in a non-virtualized system.

Private disks are typically used for system drives, where the operating system and application software reside. This separation provides increased security and isolation, as one VM's system files can't be accessed or tampered with by another VM.

Shared Disk

In contrast, shared disks can be accessed by multiple VMs concurrently. They function as a common storage pool for VMs that need to share data or for applications that require simultaneous access from different VMs.

Shared disks are particularly useful in clustering scenarios where data consistency and concurrent access are required. Examples include database clusters, file servers, and other multi-node structures that demand shared access to data.

While both types of disks have their specific use cases, they work together to enable efficient, flexible, and secure data management in a virtualized environment. The choice between private and shared disks will largely depend on the specific needs of the applications running on the VMs.

Advantages of OS Virtualization

Virtualization in operating system brings a wealth of advantages to individuals, businesses, and developers alike. From cost savings to improved testing environments, let's explore some of the key benefits of this technology:

Resource Optimization: One of the main advantages of OS virtualization is better hardware utilization. Instead of having dedicated hardware for each OS, multiple virtual machines can share the same physical resources, making use of idle capacity and reducing wastage.

Cost Reduction: By optimizing hardware usage, businesses can reduce their hardware costs significantly. Fewer physical servers mean less space, power, and cooling requirements, which translate into direct savings. Additionally, virtualization can reduce the costs associated with server maintenance and administration.

Isolation and Security: Each VM is isolated from the others, providing an inherent level of security. If one VM is compromised, the threat does not spread to other VMs on the same host. Also, isolation is beneficial for testing new software or updates without affecting the production environment.

Ease of Backup and Recovery: Virtual machines can be easily backed up and restored, improving business continuity and disaster recovery processes. VMs can be saved as images, which can then be quickly loaded onto any hardware, reducing recovery times in case of failure.

Scalability and Flexibility: OS virtualization allows for rapid provisioning and de-provisioning of resources. As business needs change, more VMs can be easily added or existing ones can be upgraded or downgraded, providing scalability and flexibility that's hard to achieve with physical servers.

Software Development and Testing: For developers, virtualization provides an easily configurable environment for testing new software and updates. They can run different OS versions on different VMs, test how their software performs on each, and easily reset the environment for repeated tests.

Energy Efficiency: By consolidating multiple VMs onto fewer physical servers, businesses can significantly reduce their energy usage and carbon footprint, contributing to environmental sustainability.

Benefits of OS Virtualization

While the advantages of operating system virtualization are mostly technical in nature, the OS virtualization benefits, or the positive impacts that those advantages can bring about, are much broader. Here are some of the key benefits:

Business Agility: With virtualization, businesses can react more quickly to changes. Whether it's scaling up operations to handle increased demand or deploying new services, virtualization allows businesses to move faster than they could with traditional physical infrastructure.

Efficient Resource Utilization: OS virtualization enables efficient utilization of system resources. Containers share the host's operating system and kernel, resulting in lower overhead compared to traditional virtualization techniques. This allows for higher consolidation ratios, meaning more containers can run on a single host, maximizing resource utilization.

Improved Performance: Since containers share the host's kernel, they bypass the need for hardware emulation or running a separate guest operating system. This leads to improved performance as there is minimal performance overhead introduced by the virtualization layer. Containers can start up quickly and have low latency, providing near-native performance.

Reduced Downtime: Virtualization can significantly reduce system downtime. Features like live migration allow virtual machines to be moved from one physical server to another without interruption, facilitating hardware maintenance and upgrades. 

Better Disaster Recovery: Virtualization simplifies disaster recovery. Entire VMs, including the operating system, applications, and data, can be backed up and restored quickly and easily. This allows businesses to recover from disasters more swiftly than they could with physical servers.

Improved IT Productivity: By abstracting hardware complexities, virtualization simplifies many IT tasks. System provisioning, configuration, and maintenance can be done more quickly and easily, freeing IT staff to focus on more strategic tasks.

Increased Application Availability: Features like fault tolerance and distributed resource scheduling ensure that critical applications remain available and perform well. If a physical server fails, the VMs running on it can be automatically restarted on another server. Similarly, if a VM needs more resources to perform optimally, they can be automatically allocated to it.

Enhanced Security and Compliance : Virtualization provides a layered defense strategy, which is very beneficial in managing security and compliance. Each virtual machine provides a secure and isolated environment, which can be controlled and monitored independently. This makes it easier to implement security policies and manage compliance.

Facts About OS Virtualization

It's Not a New Concept: While operating system virtualization might seem like a relatively recent innovation, the concept has been around for quite some time. IBM was experimenting with virtualization as early as the 1960s to maximize the use of large, expensive mainframe systems.

Containerization is Lightweight: Container-based virtualization, like Docker, is generally more lightweight than full machine virtualization. This is because containers share the host system's OS kernel, reducing the overhead of running full OS instances.

Hypervisors Rule: At the heart of operating system virtualization is the hypervisor, a piece of software, firmware, or hardware that creates and runs virtual machines. There are two types of hypervisors: Type 1 (native or bare-metal) hypervisors run directly on the host's hardware, while Type 2 (hosted) hypervisors run as a software layer on an operating system like VMware Player or VMware Workstation.

A Power-Saver: Virtualization can help save energy. By consolidating several physical servers into virtual machines on a single physical server, businesses can reduce their energy consumption and carbon footprint.

Live Migration is a Thing: One of the more impressive aspects of OS virtualization is live migration – the ability to move a running VM from one physical server to another without any downtime. 

Snapshot Magic: VM snapshots are a blessing for system administrators. A snapshot captures the complete state of a VM at a particular point in time – much like a time machine. Admins can revert a VM to a previous snapshot if something goes wrong, making system recovery quick and painless.

Security in Isolation: While sharing resources, every VM is isolated from the others. This means that even if one VM encounters a security issue, it doesn't affect the others. This is beneficial from a security standpoint as it contains potential threats.

Conclusion

Operating system virtualization is a transformative technology that has revolutionized how businesses and individuals use computing resources. By breaking down the barriers of physical hardware and providing a way to run multiple isolated systems on a single machine, it has introduced unparalleled levels of flexibility, efficiency, and resilience.

From Linux's robust KVM and containerization options to Windows' Hyper-V solution and VMware, from the disk options that provide flexibility in data management to the numerous advantages and benefits, the offerings of OS virtualization are extensive.

Whether it is better utilization of resources, cost savings, increased security, or improved disaster recovery, the benefits are compelling. KnowledgeHut Cloud training will equip you with the latest trends and learnings in operating system virtualization.