New release marks significant enhancements in performance,
security, and versatility across various architectures.
SAN
FRANCISCO, July 31, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- The Xen
Project, an open source project under the Linux Foundation, is
proud to announce the release of Xen Project 4.19. This release
marks a significant milestone in enhancing performance, security,
and versatility across various architectures, including Arm, PPC,
RISC-V, and x86, altogether providing a robust and secure
hypervisor solution for both enterprises and cloud providers.
The Xen Project continues to lead the way in virtualization
technology. With contributions from a wide and diverse range of
companies, including board members AMD, ARM, AWS, EPAM, Vates, and
XenServer, Xen Project 4.19 introduces a range of key changes and
improvements that solidify its position as a premier open-source
virtualization platform. Comprehensive improvements include
substantial enhancements in memory management, security, and system
stability, spanning multiple architectures and benefitting a wide
array of users and use cases.
"The 4.19 release is a significant achievement for the Xen
community, bringing crucial enhancements across all supported
architectures," said Kelly Choi,
Community Manager at the Xen Project. "New features such as the
x2APIC driver for x86 and dynamic node programming for Arm
highlight our focus on meeting the evolving needs of our users, and
underscores our dedication to advancing virtualization technology
with a robust, reliable and open source hypervisor."
Notable Improvements in Release 4.19 Include:
Security Enhancements
- Published 13 new Xen Security Advisories (XSAs) to mitigate
vulnerabilities.
- Adoption of additional MISRA-C rules for improved code
quality.
Arm Architecture
- Introduction of dynamic node programming using
overlay dtbo.
- FF-A notification support
x86 Architecture
- Introduce a new x2APIC driver that uses Cluster Logical
addressing mode for IPIs and physical addressing mode for
external interrupts.
- Deprecate support for XeonPhi in 4.19, with the firm plan to
remove support in 4.20.
PVH
- PVH dom0 has now moved to "supported with caveats" status
- PVH/HVM can now map foreign pages, which should for example
allow QEMU stubdomains to run as PVH
- Boot time speedup due to the IOMMU changes
- Don't expose pIRQ support to HVM guests by default. The
feature (XENFEAT_hvm_pirqs) can now be enabled on a per-domain
basis
Other updates:
- Add a new 9pfs backend running as a daemon in dom0. First user
is Xenstore-stubdom now being able to support full Xenstore trace
capability.
- libxl support for backendtype=tap with tapback.
- Increase the maximum number of CPUs Xen can be built for from
4095 to 16383.
- When building with Systemd support (./configure
--enable-systemd), remove libsystemd as a build
dependency. Systemd Notify support is retained,
now using a standalone library implementation.
- xenalyze no longer requires `--svm-mode` when analyzing traces
generated on AMD CPUs.
- Code symbol annotations and MISRA compliance improvements.
- CI updates:
- Minimum fixes to rebuild the containers, following the HEREDOC
problems.
- Rebuild containers to have testing with up-to-date LTS
distros.
- Few build system checks, and strip the obsolete contents of the
build containers.
The Xen Project 4.19 release underscores the community's
commitment to advancing virtualization technology. Visit the Xen
Project website to learn more, and join the conversation by signing
up for the Xen Project mailing list and Matrix.
Supporting Quotes
"AMD looks forward to embracing the advancements in the Xen 4.19
release. With MISRA C compliance nearing completion, this milestone
brings us closer to a safety-certifiable hypervisor.
Additionally, the support for Device Tree overlays for dynamic VM
configurations significantly enhances Xen's flexibility with AMD
FPGAs and adaptive SoCs, positioning it as a robust solution
for critical embedded applications."
– Kris Chaplin, Open Source Software
Lead - Systems Engineering, AMD.
"As a proud board member of the Xen Project, XenServer is
thrilled to witness the release of Xen 4.19. This new release
signifies a remarkable stride in code safety and memory
management across various architectures. At XenServer, we are
committed to our collaboration with the community to contribute to
the future of the Xen hypervisor. We look forward to integrating
these enhancements in security and performance into the XenServer
product, ensuring that our users can leverage the latest
advancements in virtualisation technology."
– Diego Novellon, Software Engineering Manager, XenServer
"At Vates, we are pleased with the continuous advancements of
the Xen project and are proud to contribute to its progress.
Notably, Oleksii, one of our dedicated XCP-ng developers, served as
the release manager for Xen 4.19. Currently, we are involved in the
AMD SEV projects and the Xen port to RISC-V. Alongside other board
members, we continue to elevate the Xen project's visibility,
ensuring it is recognized not only by its contributors but also
within the virtualization sector. Beyond this release, we remain
deeply committed to expanding the Xen project's reach by building
bridges with other communities and the academic world, fostering
broader collaboration and innovation through teamwork."
– Olivier Lambert, CEO, Vates
"Arm is the platform of choice for a vast ecosystem of
developers, and our ongoing work with the Xen Project continues to
be an important part of our commitment to the open source software
community. Virtualization is critical to applications like
automotive, where the XEN Hypervisor is part of the SOAFEE
open source reference implementation, and the release of Xen 4.19
brings significant improvements in dynamic node programming for the
Arm architecture. We look forward to seeing how developers leverage
this new release for future automotive use-cases on Arm."
– Andrew Wafaa, senior director, Software Communities at
Arm
About the Xen Project
The Xen Project is the home for several virtualization-related
open source projects and is licensed under the GPLv2. Hosted by the
Linux Foundation, Xen Project is focused on advancing
virtualization in a number of different commercial and open source
applications, including server virtualization, Infrastructure as a
Services (IaaS), desktop virtualization, security applications,
embedded and hardware appliances, and automotive/aviation. For more
information visit XenProject.org.
Media Contact:
Noah Lehman
The Linux Foundation
nlehman@linuxfoundation.org
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SOURCE The Linux Foundation