Re: [coLinux-devel] Re: Posix Subsystem for ReactOS - Project 2010

[Nuno S. <nun...@vg...>]

Hi!

Ian C. Blenke wrote:
> On Thu, Jan 29, 2004 at 12:42:30AM +0200, Shachar Shemesh wrote:

[..]

> parallel with OTHER kernels. Think of Linux X86 images running on a 
> Linux X86 host without UML or VMWare, running Linux PPC images on a Darwin
> box, or Linux Sparc images on a Solaris box - why limit this
> architecture purely to Microsoft?
> 

Agreed.

[..]

> 
> To truely grasp the importance what CoLinux offers, think hugely
> scalable hosting farm. The closest thing to CoLinux at the moment is
> really the Xen Hypervisor:
> 
> 	http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/Research/SRG/netos/xen/
> 
> Unfortunately, Xen isn't cross architecture, and you need to retrofit
> other kernels to run under it (see the Windows XP port limited to
> academic source licensees, or the recent NetBSD port to the same).
> 
> At the moment, UML is the hosting platform of choice for virtual Linux

I can be wrong, but I think that coLinux doesn't play in this field 
(virtual servers for *untrusted* root users) because, unlike UML or XEN, 
the "virtual" linux can bring the host down.

Disabling interrupts and entering and endless loop or /bin/cat 
/dev/random > /proc/kmem or some other havoc will do this...

Reality check:
I'm I right?

Even with this possible drawback, the system is very usefull for running 
"trusted" linux systems at (near) hardware speed.

> 
> I would LOVE to have a Linux self-hosted, ring 0 device driver driven,

Me too :-) And, as you said, there are some solutions right now, each 
with their pro's and con's.

Regards,
Nuno Silva