The Rise of Virtualization
Operating systems originally ran directly on the hardware itself and provided services to applications. With CP-67 on the IBM System/360 Model 67 and Virtual Machine Facility/370 (VM/370) on System/370, IBM introduced the notion of virtual machine, where the operating system itself runs under the control of a hypervisor, instead of being in direct control of the hardware. VMware popularized this technology on personal computers. Over time, the line between virtual machines, monitors, and operating systems was blurred:
- Hypervisors grew more complex, gaining their own application programming interface, memory management or file system.
- Virtualization becomes a key feature of operating systems, as exemplified by Hyper-V in Windows Server 2008 or HP Integrity Virtual Machines in HP-UX.
- In some systems, such as POWER5 and POWER6-based servers from IBM, the hypervisor is no longer optional.
- Applications have been re-designed to run directly on a virtual machine monitor.
In many ways, virtual machine software today plays the role formerly held by the operating system, including managing the hardware resources (processor, memory, I/O devices), applying scheduling policies, or allowing system administrators to manage systems.
Read more about this topic: History Of Operating Systems
Famous quotes containing the word rise:
“The fact is that love is of two kinds—one which commands, and one which obeys. The two are quite distinct, and the passion to which the one gives rise is not the passion of the other.”
—Honoré De Balzac (1799–1850)