Understanding solutions such as XenApp, Hyper-V, and vSphere is crucial in case you are starting to work with virtualized and cloud systems. Working with a virtual machine has its benefits because it is efficient and is like an isolated duplicate of the real machine. One huge beneficial factor about a virtual machine is that it helps you recover faster from disaster due to its availability and efficiency. With virtualization, you can expand your hardware’s capabilities, control IT-related costs, and improve the security and reliability of your system.
So, What Exactly Is a Hypervisor?
A hypervisor is simply a program that makes work easier. Reason being, it enables you to host a number of different virtual machines in a single hardware. What’s more fascinating about a hypervisor is that each of the virtual machines you host on it can run their own programs. It will appear as if the system has its own hardware processor, resources, and memory. Of course, this, in reality, isn’t the case.
What is actually happening is that the resources are allocated to the virtual machines by the hypervisor. What’s more surprising is that hypervisors are not a recent discovery. They have been there since the 1960s, as that’s when they were introduced. During that time, they were used to enable different operating systems on one mainframe computer.
Types of Hypervisors
There are two types of hypervisors. They include;
- Hosted/embedded hypervisors
- Bare metal/native hypervisors
- Hosted/Embedded Hypervisors
This type of hypervisor is run on the hardware of the host to be able to control and manage the virtual machine as well. The various places that use this type of hypervisor include;
- Oracle VM Server for x86
- Citrix XenServer
- VMware ESX/ESXi
- Microsoft Hyper-V hypervisor
- Embedded/Hosted Hypervisor
Also known as type II hypervisors, these are the types of hypervisors which run with the help of software, using an OS like FreeBSD, Linux, and Windows. VMware Workstation, VirtualBox, and Virtage hypervisor are classified as Embedded/hosted hypervisors.
How It Works
The hypervisor is executed by the servers. This, in turn, makes the hypervisor load the client’s OS of the virtual machine. The various resources allocated by the hypervisor, in this case, include memory, storage space for the disk of every virtual machine, and the CPU resources. There are various methods such as API calls that a virtual machine can use for creating requests to the hypervisor.
You can also host a virtual desktop on a server easily using a hypervisor. The virtual desktop can act as a replica of the physical desktop of the user. A virtual desktop allows employees to work remotely as they can easily access their PCs through the internet.
However, one thing you have to note is that, due to the design of hypervisors, they are normally a target for hackers. The disadvantage is that hypervisors have vulnerabilities to malicious codes. Therefore, it is highly advisable for you to use your hypervisor in the best way possible. Learn the vulnerabilities that your hypervisor has and know how to manage them efficiently.
Bottom Line
Hypervisors for virtualization is a great solution and helps to make things quite easier. Therefore, learn to use them efficiently and also manage the risks in the right manner.
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