Virtual Versus Physical - Virtio Changes for New Hardware

Explore the evolution of virtualization technology in this 28-minute conference talk by Michael S. Tsirkin from Red Hat. Delve into the differences between virtual and physical hardware, examining the Virtio interface and its adaptations for new hardware. Learn about split and packed virtqueues, performance optimizations, and solutions for live migration challenges. Understand cross-vendor compatibility issues and techniques for descriptor fragmentation avoidance. Gain insights into the latest developments in virtualization, including partial ordering, page fault handling, and post-copy migration strategies.

Virtual versus physical
Virtio Interface Zoo
Why hardware virtio?
Split Virtqueue
Packed Virtqueue: portability
Remove flags read
Reduce number of writes
Virtio net RX stalls
Out of order use of buffers
VIRTIO_F_PARTIAL_ORDER
Page faults: more goodies
Post copy migration
Live migration solutions
Live migration issues
Cross-vendor compatibility
Descriptor fragmentation (cont.)
Descriptor fragmentation avoidance
Summary
Questions?