Virtualization: An Excuse for Shitty Operating System Software Support
In honor of my friend @quine on Twitter who today complained thusly:
In case you're reading this with Lynx (you web pimp, you!,) Zach was lamenting the fact that vendors who don't support customer operating systems of choice are simply sloughing off development efforts and support by suggesting that customers should simply run it as a VM instead.
Ah, it used to be called "software," but now it's a "virtual appliance!" Silly rabbit, tricks are for kids.
One might suggest this is a perfectly reasonable use of virtualization technology — neigh one of the very purposes behind its genesis. I'd agree, to a point. However, I've noticed an alarming uptake recently by product managers who are simply short-cutting roadmap/development paths by taking the "lazy" way out.
Hey, it cuts down support, testing, regression and troubleshooting…for the vendor. But in my favorite commentary, it's simply a "squeezing the balloon problem" because it surfaces a whole host of other issues such as performance, scale, and in some cases support for various virtualization platforms.
What say you? Do you see this happening more in your enterprise? Do you care? Is it a good thing?
/Hoff
At this point in time, I'd be happy to have the option (or strong suggestion) to use a virtual appliance for some applications.
I'm still in the phase of arguing with most ISVs regarding antiquated licensing frameworks. Oracle anyone?
However, for the rest, I ask (strongly) for virtual appliance delivered applications.
Virgil
To hide complexity just add another abstraction layer: virtualize!
We seem to have the opposite problem. Vendors don't support their app running in VM's. (Including an app from the largest network vendor in the world).
VMs are the latest in the fantasy that marketers sell in turn-key systems management.
Why manage one set of system and software when you can manage a bunch of layered solutions. It's Web 2.0 for systems management.
VMs are simply a manifestation of the fact that we have failed utterly to “solve” system administration (for any significant measure of “solve”). What’s worse is that VMs are now being used to do exactly what an operating system is FOR: separate processes and provide virtual memory separation. Call your hypervisor “ring zero” and each VM a “process” and you’re suddenly looking at a kludgy bag of fish guts attempting to masquerade as an operating system. The problem is that the industry is going to make exactly the same mistakes over and over and you can be sure that, in a few years, there will be some convenient (for performance reasons!) path that allows a process (excuse me, VM) to load a device driver or access a keyboard/display across the hypervisor (excuse me, shared memory) and it’s going to be Windows all over again.
If the “operating systems” we had available today actually had the desirable properties that operating systems SHOULD have, we wouldn’t need VMs at all. Virtualization and interprocess separation/access to shared resources is what an operating system is supposed to do!
"If the "operating systems" we had available today actually had the desirable properties that operating systems SHOULD have, we wouldn't need VMs at all. Virtualization and interprocess separation/access to shared resources is what an operating system is supposed to do!"
Totally agree. I don't remember who it was that said it, but basically if we didn't have Windows, we wouldn't have a need for virtualization…oh wait, we said that at that Forum, didn't we!? 😉
…and finally….
" in a few years, there will be some convenient (for performance reasons!) path that allows a process (excuse me, VM) to load a device driver or access a keyboard/display across the hypervisor (excuse me, shared memory) and it's going to be Windows all over again."
Um, we already have both. 🙁
/Hoff