RFC Xen i386 paravirtualization support
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- v1 RFC Latest33 patches 63 repliesIn review
Patches in v1 No applies recorded yet
| # | Subject and files | Size | Replies | Applied |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1/33 | Add apply_to_page_range() functioninclude/ mm/ | +99 | 3 replies | |
| 2/33 | Add sync bitopsinclude/ include/ | +199 | 4 replies | |
| 3/33 | Add nosegneg capability to the vsyscall page notesarch/ | +29 | 0 replies | |
| 4/33 | Add XEN config options and disable unsupported config options.arch/ arch/ arch/ +3 more | +41 | 2 replies | |
| 5/33 | Makefile support to build Xen subarcharch/ arch/ | +12 | 4 replies | |
| 6/33 | Add Xen interface header filesinclude/ include/ include/ +13 more | +2174 | 0 replies | |
| 7/33 | Hypervisor interface header files.include/ include/ | +378 | 0 replies | |
| 8/33 | Add vmlinuz build target.arch/ arch/ | +12 | 0 replies | |
| 9/33 | Add start-of-day setup hooks to subarcharch/ arch/ arch/ +8 more | +154 | 5 replies | |
| 10/33 | add support for Xen feature queriesarch/ drivers/ drivers/ +4 more | +61 | 0 replies | |
| 11/33 | Add Xen-specific memory management definitionsarch/ arch/ include/ +2 more | +113 | 0 replies | |
| 12/33 | Change __FIXADDR_TOP to leave room for the hypervisor.include/ include/ include/ | +25 | 0 replies | |
| 13/33 | Add a new head.S start-of-day file for booting on Xen.arch/ arch/ arch/ +2 more | +226 | 2 replies | |
| 14/33 | subarch support for controlling interrupt deliveryarch/ arch/ include/ +4 more | +174 | 0 replies | |
| 15/33 | move segment checks to subarcharch/ arch/ include/ +5 more | +31 | 5 replies | |
| 16/33 | Add support for Xen to entry.S.arch/ arch/ arch/ +1 more | +169 | 6 replies | |
| 17/33 | Support loading an initrd when running on Xenarch/ arch/ include/ | +12 | 0 replies | |
| 18/33 | Subarch support for CPUID instructionarch/ include/ include/ +1 more | +27 | 6 replies | |
| 19/33 | Support gdt/idt/ldt handling on Xen.arch/ include/ include/ +1 more | +138 | 0 replies | |
| 20/33 | subarch support for interrupt and exception gatesarch/ arch/ include/ +2 more | +60 | 0 replies | |
| 21/33 | subarch support for control register accessesinclude/ include/ include/ | +111 | 0 replies | |
| 22/33 | subarch stack pointer updateinclude/ include/ include/ | +16 | 0 replies | |
| 23/33 | subarch TLB supportinclude/ include/ include/ | +85 | 2 replies | |
| 24/33 | Add support for Xen event channels.arch/ drivers/ include/ +1 more | +1110 | 0 replies | |
| 25/33 | Implement timekeeping for Xenarch/ arch/ arch/ +4 more | +399 | 2 replies | |
| 26/33 | subarch suport for idle loop (NO_IDLE_HZ for Xen)arch/ drivers/ drivers/ +1 more | +91 | 0 replies | |
| 27/33 | Add the Xen virtual console driver.arch/ drivers/ drivers/ +4 more | +824 | 3 replies | |
| 28/33 | Add Xen grant table supportdrivers/ drivers/ include/ | +534 | 4 replies | |
| 29/33 | Add Xen driver utility functions.drivers/ drivers/ include/ | +88 | 0 replies | |
| 30/33 | Add the Xenbus sysfs and virtual device hotplug driver.drivers/ drivers/ drivers/ +5 more | +2782 | 0 replies | |
| 31/33 | Add Xen subarch reboot supportarch/ drivers/ | +233 | 1 reply | |
| 32/33 | Add the Xen virtual network device driver.drivers/ drivers/ drivers/ +2 more | +1606 | 12 replies | |
| 33/33 | Add Xen virtual block device driver.drivers/ drivers/ drivers/ +4 more | +1202 | 6 replies |
Reviews trailers per patch
No Reviewed-by, Acked-by or Tested-by trailers for v1 yet.
Cover letter [RFC PATCH 00/33] Xen i386 paravirtualization support
Unlike full virtualization in which the virtual machine provides the same platform interface as running natively on the hardware, paravirtualization requires modification to the guest operating system to work with the platform interface provided by the hypervisor.
Xen was designed with performance in mind. Calls to the hypervisor are minimized, batched if necessary, and non-critical codepaths are left unmodified in the case where the privileged instruction can be trapped and emulated by the hypervisor. The Xen API is designed to be OS agnostic and has had Linux, NetBSD, FreeBSD, Solaris, Plan9 and Netware ported to it. Xen also provides support for running directly on native hardware.
The following patch series provides the minimal support required to launch Xen paravirtual guests on standard x86 hardware running the Xen hypervisor. These patches effectively port the Linux kernel to run on the platform interface provided by Xen. This port is done as an i386 subarch.
With these patches you will be able to launch an unprivileged guest running the modified Linux kernel and unmodified userspace. This guest is x86, UP only, runs in shadow translated mode, and has no direct access to hardware. This simplifies the patchset to the minimum functionality needed to support a paravirtualized guest. It's worth noting that a fair amount of this patchset deals with paravirtualizing I/O, not just CPU-only. The additional missing functionality is primarily about full SMP support, optimizations such as direct writable page tables, and the management interface.
At a high-level, the patches provide the following:
- Kconfig and Makefile changes required to support Xen
- subarch changes to allow more platform functionality to be implemented by an i386 subarch
- Xen subarch implementation
- start of day code for running in the hypervisor provided environment (paging enabled)
- basic Xen drivers to provide a fully functional guest
The Xen platform API encapsulates the following types of requirements:
- idt, gdt, ldt (descriptor table handling)
- cr2, fpu_taskswitch, debug registers (privileged register handling)
- mmu (page table, tlb, and cache handling)
- memory reservations
- time and timer
- vcpu (init, up/down vcpu)
- schedule (processor yield, shutdown, etc)
- event channel (generalized virtual interrupt handling)
- grant table (shared memory interface for high speed interdomain communication)
- block device I/O
- network device I/O
- console device I/O
- Xen feature map
- Xen version info
Thanks to all have reviewed earlier versions of these patches. -chris
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