Hypervisor selection in CloudStack
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The document discusses hypervisor selection for cloud environments, emphasizing the importance of clearly defining service offerings, compliance, and availability expectations. It compares various hypervisors—XenServer, KVM, vSphere, and Linux containers—highlighting their strengths, weaknesses, and specific use cases while addressing storage, networking, and virtualization capabilities. The presentation aims to guide organizations in choosing the right hypervisor based on operational needs and resource management requirements.
Hypervisor selection in CloudStack
- 1. Hypervisor Selection in Cloud Understanding the choices available CloudStack Collaboration Conference Europe 2013 Tim Mackey – XenServer Community Evangelist
- 2. Building a successful cloud What are we trying to accomplish?
- 3. Service Offerings • Clearly define what you want to offer ᵒ What types of applications ᵒ Who has access, and who owns them ᵒ What type of access • Define how templates need to be managed ᵒ Operating system support ᵒ Patching requirements • Define expectations around compliance and availability ᵒ Who owns backup and monitoring © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy
- 4. Define Tenancy Requirements • Department data local to department ᵒ Where is the application data stored • Data and service isolation ᵒ VM migration and host HA ᵒ Network services • Encryption of PII/PCI ᵒ Where do keys live when data location unknown ᵒ Need encryption designed for the cloud • Showback to stakeholders ᵒ More than just usage, compliance and audits © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy
- 5. Virtualization Infrastructure • Hypervisor defined by service offerings ᵒ ᵒ ᵒ ᵒ Don’t select hypervisor based on “standards” Understand true costs of virtualization Multiple hypervisors are “OK” Bare metal can be a hypervisor • To “Pool” resources or not ᵒ Is there a real requirement for pooled resources ᵒ Can the cloud management solution do better? ᵒ Real cost of shared storage • Primary storage defined by hypervisor • Template storage defined by solution ᵒ Typically low cost options like NFS © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy
- 6. The primary choices ….
- 7. XenServer Guest Guest Driver front Driver front Standard Linux Distribution (dom0) xapi patches Driver back drivers qemu Xen Project Hypervisor Compute Networking © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy Storage
- 8. KVM (Linux + KVM only) Guest Guest Virtual driver Virtual driver libvirt Standard Linux Distribution KVM Module agent Compute virtio drivers Networking © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy qemu Storage
- 9. vSphere 5.1 Managed by vCenter Guest Guest Virtual driver Virtual driver Service Console vCenter vmkernel Task Scheduler vNIC vSCSI vmklinux Compute Networking © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy drivers Storage
- 10. Linux Containers Namespace Container Namespace Container Cgroup Cgroup libvirt Standard Linux Distribution Namesspaces Cgroups Compute Networking © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy KVM Module agent Storage
- 12. Flat Network – Basic Layer 3 Network Feature XenServer vSphere KVM LXC Security Groups Yes- bridge No Yes Yes IPv6 No No Yes Yes Multiple IPs per NIC Yes Yes Yes Yes Nicira NVP Yes No Yes No BigSwitch VNS Yes No Yes Public Network 65.11.0.0/16 No Security Group 1 65.11.1.2 65.11.1.3 65.11.1.4 65.11.1.5 DHCP, DNS © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy CloudStack Virtual Router Guest VM 1 Guest VM 2 Guest VM 3 Guest VM 4 Security Group 2
- 13. VLANs for Private Cloud Feature XenServer vSphere KVM LXC Max VLANs 800 254 1024 1024 IPv6 No No Yes Yes Multiple IPs per NIC Yes Yes Yes Yes Nicira NVP Yes No Yes No BigSwitch VNS Yes No Yes No MidoKura No No Yes No VPC Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Public Network/Internet Public IP 65.37.14.1 No NetScaler Guest Virtual Network 10.0.0.0/8 VLAN 100 No F5 BigIP Yes Yes Yes No Juniper SRX No Yes Yes No Cisco VNMC No Yes No No © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy CloudStack Virtual Router DHCP, DNS NAT Load Balancing VPN Gateway 10.1.1.1 10.1.1.1 10.1.1.3 10.1.1.4 10.1.1.5 Guest VM 1 Guest VM 2 Guest VM 3 Guest VM 4
- 14. Beyond the VLAN – Network Virtualization Feature XenServer vSphere KVM LXC OVS GRE tunnels Yes No No No Nicira STT tunnel Yes No Yes No MidoNet No No Yes No VXLAN No Yes No No NVGRE No No No No Nexus 1000v No Yes No No © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy
- 15. Virtual Private Cloud and nTier Applications Feature PVLAN XenServer Yes - ovs vSphere Yes KVM ovs LXC No DC2 DC1 DC3 VLAN 1 DC4 Web S2S VPN Router VLAN 2 App Private GW VLAN 3 DC5 DC6 DB © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy
- 16. Delivering specific network services • IPv6 KVM is your only virtualized option (basic or advanced) • Maximum VLANs XenServer or KVM are your best options • Security Groups XenServer or KVM are your options • VXLAN requires vSphere Enterprise Plus • Cisco Nexus 1000v and ASA 1000v require vSphere Enterprise Plus © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy
- 17. Instances need a home Storage, Storage and more Storage
- 18. Primary Storage Options Feature XenServer vSphere KVM LXC Local storage Yes Yes Yes Yes NFS Yes Yes Yes Yes Host Single path iSCSI Yes Yes Yes No Host Multipath iSCSI PreSetup No No No Direct array No VAAI No No Shared Mount No No Yes Yes Template format VHD OVA QCOW2 TAR © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy Primary Storage Cluster
- 19. Core virtualization capabilities The limits and features which matter
- 20. CloudStack Features Feature XenServer vSphere KVM LXC Disk IO Statistics Yes No Yes Memory Overcommit Yes (4x) Yes No No Dedicated resources Yes Not with HA/DRS Yes No Disk IO throttling No No Yes Yes Disk snapshot (running) Yes Yes No No Disk snapshot (Stopped) Yes Yes Yes No Memory snapshot Yes Yes Yes No Zone wide primary storage No Yes Yes Yes Resize disk Offline Online Grow Online No High availability CloudStack Native CloudStack No © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy
- 21. XenServer 6.2 Feature Source code model Open Source (GPLv2) Maximum VM Density 650 CloudStack VM Density 150 CloudStack integration Direct XAPI calls Maximum native cluster Size 16 Maximum pRAM 1 TB Largest VM 16vCPU/128GB Windows Operating System All Windows supported by Microsoft Linux Operating Systems RHEL, CentOS, Debian, Ubuntu, SLES, OEL Advanced features supported ovs, Storage XenMotion, DMC © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy
- 22. vSphere 5.1 (vSphere 5.5 not supported) Feature Source code model Proprietary Maximum VM Density 512 CloudStack VM Density 128 CloudStack integration vCenter Maximum native cluster Size 32 Maximum pRAM 2 TB Largest VM 64 vCPU/1TB Windows Operating Systems DOS, All Windows Server/Client Linux Operating Systems Most Advanced features supported HA, DRS, DVS, Storage vMotion © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy
- 23. KVM (RHEL/CentOS 6.3 and Ubuntu 12.04) Feature Source code model Open Source (GPLv2) Maximum VM Density 10 times the number of pCores CloudStack VM Density 50 CloudStack integration CloudStack Agent (libvirt) Maximum native cluster size No native cluster support Maximum pRAM 2 TB Largest VM Windows Operating Systems Linux Operating Systems Advanced features supported None © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy
- 24. Linux Containers Feature Source code model Open Source (GPLv2) Maximum container Density 6000 (theoretical) CloudStack container Density 50 CloudStack integration CloudStack Agent (libvirt), requires KVM for SVMs Maximum native cluster size N/A Maximum pRAM 2 TB Largest container 2TB Windows Operating Systems N/A Linux Operating Systems Kernel compatible distros © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy
- 25. Picking the “best one” When to use which hypervisor…
- 26. KVM • Primary value proposition: ᵒ Low cost with available vendor support ᵒ Familiar administration model ᵒ Broad CloudStack feature set with active development • Cloud use cases: ᵒ ᵒ ᵒ ᵒ Linux centric workloads Dev/test clouds Web hosting Tenant density which dictates SDN options • Weaknesses: ᵒ Requires use of an installed CloudStack libvirt agent ᵒ Limited native storage options ᵒ No use of advanced native features © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy
- 27. Linux Containers • Primary value proposition: ᵒ Low cost with available vendor support ᵒ Familiar administration model • Cloud use cases: ᵒ Dev/test clouds ᵒ Web hosting • Weaknesses: ᵒ Requires use of an installed CloudStack libvirt agent ᵒ Requires KVM for system VMs ᵒ No use of advanced native features © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy
- 28. vSphere • Primary value proposition: ᵒ ᵒ ᵒ ᵒ ᵒ Broad application and operating system support Readily available pool of vSphere administration talent Large eco-system of vendor partners Many CloudStack features are native implementations Direct feature integration via vCenter • Cloud use cases: ᵒ Private enterprise clouds ᵒ Dev/test clouds • Weaknesses: ᵒ vSphere up-front license and ongoing support costs ᵒ vCenter integration requires redundant designs ᵒ Single data center per zone model © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy
- 29. XenServer • Primary value proposition: ᵒ ᵒ ᵒ ᵒ Low cost with available vendor support Broad CloudStack feature set with active development Large CloudStack install base Direct integration via XAPI toolstack • Cloud use cases: ᵒ ᵒ ᵒ ᵒ ᵒ Linux centric workloads Dev/test clouds Web hosting Desktop as a Service clouds Large VM and tenant • Weaknesses: ᵒ Minimal use of advanced native features © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy
- 30. What About Multiple Hypervisor Support? • vSphere Datacenter must be contained within a single zone • Force system VMs to a specific hypervisor type • HA won’t migrate between hypervisors • Zone wide primary storage doesn’t support multiple hypervisors • Capacity planning at the cluster/pod level more difficult © Citrix 2013. More information at xenserver.org and follow me on twitter @XenServerArmy
- 31. Work better. Live better.