Jamie Cameron, the author of Webmin, did a talk on linux virtualization at Peninsula Linux Users Group (PENLUG) in the Bayshore Technology Park in Redwood City tonite.
He’s working on 2 new products, Virtualmin and Cloudmin, so has had to learn the ins and outs of the current state of linux virtualization with respect to hosting.
His favorite is Xen, but for some reason Redhat is providing more support for KVM (Kernel Virtual Machine), which has several disadvantages including lack of CPU limiting. Redhat acquired KVM resources in 2008.
OpenVZ is popular with budget hosting providers, and Virtuozzo with those that want to pay.
Linux-VServer is the lightest weight alternative, similar to FreeBSD jails, but also the least maintained at this point.
He gave a demo of Cloudmin, including creating a guest and logging into it.
Since Linux has no ABI standard, he prefers developing in scripting languages like Perl for maximum portability.
wikipedia: webmin
Ganeti is a “cluster virtual server management software tool built on top of existing virtualization technologies such as Xen or KVM and other Open Source software.”
