XenServer and OpenStack

John Garbutt, Senior Software Developer, Citrix

@johngarbutt

27th September 2012

But Citrix does CloudStack?… but still got 3 people full time on OpenStack

Why use Xen?… because it was built for the Cloud!

History of Xen

We propose a system that can execute code supplied by an untrusted user, yet can charge this user for all resources consumed by the computation. Such servers could be deployed at strategic locations throughout the Internet

Xenoservers: Accounted execution of untrusted code

IEEE Hot Topics in Operating Systems VII

March 1999

• Open Source with a large community and ecosystem

• Mature and “Cloud Proven”ᵒ Amazon, Rackspace and many others

• True Type 1 hypervisorᵒ Reduced TCBᵒ Best security, isolation, performance, scalability mix

• Probably 10-12 Million OpenSource Usersᵒ e.g. 3 x people on Debian have used Xen in the last 30 days vs KVMᵒ 12% of Ubuntu Servers hosted on Xen

Why use Xen today?

“Type 1” vs “Type 2” Hypervisor

What is XenAPI?

Xen Terminology

Xen = virtual machine monitor

XenAPI = API to manage Xen

XAPI = XenAPI deamon

Dom0 = trusted management VM

DomU = untrusted guest VM

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How can I get started?

Xen Cloud Platform (XCP)

• Includes Xen and XAPI

• Supported by Xen Community

• Fully OpenSource

• xcp-xapi packageᵒ Debian Wheezy & Ubuntu Preciseᵒ Hopefully in Fedora soon

• http://xen.org/products/cloudxen.html

Citrix XenServer

• Includes Xen and XAPI

• Fully Supported by Citrix

• Free editionᵒ Windows VMsᵒ Pool based Live Migration

http://citrix.com/xenserver/download

XenAPI with OpenStack?… it’s what Rackspace use!

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How can I get started?

Getting Startedhttps://github.com/openstack-dev/devstack/blob/master/tools/xen

Install XenServer Run DevStack

Ideas for the Future… help us choose and help us code?

Even Better IsolationLook at Citrix XenClient XT

Where can I find out more?

• http://wiki.openstack.org/XenServer

• http://wiki.openstack.org/HypervisorSupportMatrix

• http://docs.openstack.org/trunk/openstack-compute/admin/content/introduction-to-xen.html

• http://wiki.xen.org

Further Reading

Q&A

Work better. Live better.