LinuxConf Europe 2007

Photos and reports

Timetable

Programme

Registration

LPI Exams

Conference Dinner (Sunday)

Duxford Excursion (Monday)

Exhibitors and Sponsors

Accommodation

Venue

Travel

About Cambridge

Kernel Summit 2007

Other GUUG events

Other UKUUG events

Kuniyasu Suzaki - National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Techno

OS Circular on QEMU/KQEMU/KVM/Xen-HVM

OS Circular is a Internet Disk Image Distributor framework for virtual machines. The disk image is mounted by a trusted HTTP-FUSE CLOOP on the host OS. It offers a virtual disk file to the guest OS.

HTTP-FUSE CLOOP re-constructs a virtual disk file with block files. The necessary block files are downloaded from HTTP Servers. The name of the block file is the SHA1 of its contents and block files are mapped to a virtual disk with index file which has location information of SHA1 file names. The SHA1 file name is used to check the validity of its contents when it is re-mapped to the virtual disk. Block files are cached on local storage and they make a disconnected network possible. Versioning can be handled with partial updates. The block files are distributed by HTTP because we can utilize inexpensive Web hosting services, mirror severs and proxies for world wide deployment.

The guest OS assumes the QEMU Device Model and is bootable on QEMU, KQEMU, KVM and Xen-HVM. The Guest OS is installed by the normal installer and maintained by the package manager. It makes easy to update the Guest OS. The update can change the kernel because the virtual machines offer full virtualization.

OS Circular acts the installation for reference. It allows for the selection of new or old OS images at boot time. New OS images let you test new functions before installing them on the hard disk. Old OS images let you keep old application software so you can open files in old formats.

The current implementation supports Debian GNU/Linux. There are two web servers in the EU, three in the US and ten in Japan. They make for quick download and fast boot.

Submitted paper

Paper (PDF) and Paper (tgz) .