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[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index] [Xen-devel] [PATCH RFC v2] Add SUPPORT.md
Add a machine-readable file to describe what features are in what state of being 'supported', as well as information about how long this release will be supported, and so on. The document should be formatted using "semantic newlines" [1], to make changes easier. Signed-off-by: Ian Jackson <ian.jackson@xxxxxxxxxx> Signed-off-by: George Dunlap <george.dunlap@xxxxxxxxxx> [1] http://rhodesmill.org/brandon/2012/one-sentence-per-line/ --- Sorry, I wrote a 'changes since v1' but managed to lose it. I'll reply to this mail tomorrow with a list of changes. CC: Ian Jackson <ian.jackson@xxxxxxxxxx> CC: Wei Liu <wei.liu2@xxxxxxxxxx> CC: Andrew Cooper <andrew.cooper3@xxxxxxxxxx> CC: Jan Beulich <jbeulich@xxxxxxxx> CC: Tim Deegan <tim@xxxxxxx> CC: Dario Faggioli <dario.faggioli@xxxxxxxxxx> CC: Tamas K Lengyel <tamas.lengyel@xxxxxxxxxxxx> CC: Roger Pau Monne <roger.pau@xxxxxxxxxx> CC: Stefano Stabellini <sstabellini@xxxxxxxxxx> CC: Anthony Perard <anthony.perard@xxxxxxxxxx> CC: Paul Durrant <paul.durrant@xxxxxxxxxx> CC: Konrad Wilk <konrad.wilk@xxxxxxxxxx> CC: Julien Grall <julien.grall@xxxxxxx> --- SUPPORT.md | 821 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 821 insertions(+) create mode 100644 SUPPORT.md diff --git a/SUPPORT.md b/SUPPORT.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000..e30664feca --- /dev/null +++ b/SUPPORT.md @@ -0,0 +1,821 @@ +# Support statement for this release + +This document describes the support status and in particular the +security support status of the Xen branch within which you find it. + +See the bottom of the file for the definitions of the support status +levels etc. + +# Release Support + + Xen-Version: 4.10-unstable + Initial-Release: n/a + Supported-Until: TBD + Security-Support-Until: Unreleased - not yet security-supported + +# Feature Support + +## Host Architecture + +### x86-64 + + Status: Supported + +### ARM v7 + Virtualization Extensions + + Status: Supported + +### ARM v8 + + Status: Supported + +## Guest Type + +### x86/PV + + Status: Supported + +Traditional Xen Project PV guest + +### x86/HVM + + Status: Supported + +Fully virtualised guest using hardware virtualisation extensions + +Requires hardware virtualisation support + +### x86/PVH guest + + Status: Tech Preview + +PVHv2 guest support + +Requires hardware virtualisation support + +### ARM guest + + Status: Supported + +ARM only has one guest type at the moment + +## Limits/Host + +### CPUs + + Limit, x86: 4095 + Limit, ARM32: 8 + Limit, ARM64: 128 + +Note that for x86, very large number of cpus may not work/boot, +but we will still provide security support + +### x86/RAM + + Limit, x86: 16TiB + Limit, ARM32: 16GiB + Limit, ARM64: 5TiB + +[XXX: Andy to suggest what this should say for x86] + +## Limits/Guest + +### Virtual CPUs + + Limit, x86 PV: 512 + Limit, x86 HVM: 128 + Limit, ARM32: 8 + Limit, ARM64: 128 + +[XXX Andrew Cooper: Do want to add "Limit-Security" here for some of these?] + +### Virtual RAM + + Limit, x86 PV: >1TB + Limit, x86 HVM: 1TB + Limit, ARM32: 16GiB + Limit, ARM64: 1TB + +### x86 PV/Event Channels + + Limit: 131072 + +## Toolstack + +### xl + + Status: Supported + +### Direct-boot kernel image format + + Supported, x86: bzImage + Supported, ARM32: zImage + Supported, ARM64: Image + +Format which the toolstack accept for direct-boot kernels + +### Qemu based disk backend (qdisk) for xl + + Status: Supported + +### Open vSwitch integration for xl + + Status: Supported + +### systemd support for xl + + Status: Supported + +### JSON output support for xl + + Status: Experimental + +Output of information in machine-parseable JSON format + +### AHCI support for xl + + Status, x86: Supported + +### ACPI guest + + Status, x86 HVM: Supported + Status, ARM: Tech Preview + +### PVUSB support for xl + + Status: Supported + +### HVM USB passthrough for xl + + Status, x86: Supported + +### QEMU backend hotplugging for xl + + Status: Supported + +### Virtual cpu hotplug + + Status: Supported + +## Toolstack/3rd party + +### libvirt driver for xl + + Status: Supported, Security support external + +## Debugging, analysis, and crash post-mortem + +### gdbsx + + Status, x86: Supported + +Debugger to debug ELF guests + +### Guest serial sonsole + + Status: Supported + +Logs key hypervisor and Dom0 kernel events to a file + +### Soft-reset for PV guests + + Status: Supported + +Soft-reset allows a new kernel to start 'from scratch' with a fresh VM state, +but with all the memory from the previous state of the VM intact. +This is primarily designed to allow "crash kernels", +which can do core dumps of memory to help with debugging in the event of a crash. + +### xentrace + + Status, x86: Supported + +Tool to capture Xen trace buffer data + +### gcov + + Status: Supported, Not security supported + +Export hypervisor coverage data suitable for analysis by gcov or lcov. + +## Memory Management + +### Memory Ballooning + + Status: Supported + +### Memory Sharing + + Status, x86 HVM: Tech Preview + Status, ARM: Tech Preview + +Allow sharing of identical pages between guests + +### Memory Paging + + Status, x86 HVM: Experimenal + +Allow pages belonging to guests to be paged to disk + +### Transcendent Memory + + Status: Experimental + +[XXX Add description] + +### Alternative p2m + + Status, x86 HVM: Tech Preview + Status, ARM: Tech Preview + +Allows external monitoring of hypervisor memory +by maintaining multiple physical to machine (p2m) memory mappings. + +## Resource Management + +### CPU Pools + + Status: Supported + +Groups physical cpus into distinct groups called "cpupools", +with each pool having the capability of using different schedulers and scheduling properties. + +### Credit Scheduler + + Status: Supported + +The default scheduler, which is a weighted proportional fair share virtual CPU scheduler. + +### Credit2 Scheduler + + Status: Supported + +Credit2 is a general purpose scheduler for Xen, +designed with particular focus on fairness, responsiveness and scalability + +### RTDS based Scheduler + + Status: Experimental + +A soft real-time CPU scheduler built to provide guaranteed CPU capacity to guest VMs on SMP hosts + +### ARINC653 Scheduler + + Status: Supported, Not security supported + +A periodically repeating fixed timeslice scheduler. Multicore support is not yet implemented. + +### Null Scheduler + + Status: Experimental + +A very simple, very static scheduling policy +that always schedules the same vCPU(s) on the same pCPU(s). +It is designed for maximum determinism and minimum overhead +on embedded platforms. + +### Numa scheduler affinity + + Status, x86: Supported + +Enables Numa aware scheduling in Xen + +## Scalability + +### 1GB/2MB super page support + + Status: Supported + +### x86/PV-on-HVM + + Status: Supported + +This is a useful label for a set of hypervisor features +which add paravirtualized functionality to HVM guests +for improved performance and scalability. +This includes exposing event channels to HVM guests. + +### x86/Deliver events to PVHVM guests using Xen event channels + + Status: Supported + +## High Availability and Fault Tolerance + +### Live Migration, Save & Restore + + Status, x86: Supported + +### Remus Fault Tolerance + + Status: Experimental + +### COLO Manager + + Status: Experimental + +### x86/vMCE + + Status: Supported + +Forward Machine Check Exceptions to Appropriate guests + +## Virtual driver support, guest side + +[XXX Consider adding 'frontend' and 'backend' to the titles in these two sections to make it clearer] + +### Blkfront + + Status, Linux: Supported + Status, FreeBSD: Supported, Security support external + Status, Windows: Supported + +Guest-side driver capable of speaking the Xen PV block protocol + +### Netfront + + Status, Linux: Supported + States, Windows: Supported + Status, FreeBSD: Supported, Security support external + Status, NetBSD: Supported, Security support external + Status, OpenBSD: Supported, Security support external + +Guest-side driver capable of speaking the Xen PV networking protocol + +### Xen Framebuffer + + Status, Linux (xen-fbfront): Supported + +Guest-side driver capable of speaking the Xen PV Framebuffer protocol + +### Xen Console + + Status, Linux (hvc_xen): Supported + Status, Windows: Supported + +Guest-side driver capable of speaking the Xen PV console protocol + +### Xen PV keyboard + + Status, Linux (xen-kbdfront): Supported + Status, Windows: Supported + +Guest-side driver capable of speaking the Xen PV keyboard protocol + +[XXX 'Supported' here depends on the version we ship in 4.10 having some fixes] + +### Xen PVUSB protocol + + Status, Linux: Supported + +### Xen PV SCSI protocol + + Status, Linux: Supported, with caveats + +NB that while the pvSCSU frontend is in Linux and tested regularly, +there is currently no xl support. + +### Xen TPMfront + + Status, Linux (xen-tpmfront): Tech Preview + +Guest-side driver capable of speaking the Xen PV TPM protocol + +### Xen 9pfs frontend + + Status, Linux: Tech Preview + +Guest-side driver capable of speaking the Xen 9pfs protocol + +### PVCalls frontend + + Status, Linux: Tech Preview + +Guest-side driver capable of making pv system calls + +## Virtual device support, host side + +### Blkback + + Status, Linux (blkback): Supported + Status, FreeBSD (blkback): Supported + Status, QEMU (xen_disk): Supported + Status, Blktap2: Deprecated + +Host-side implementations of the Xen PV block protocol + +### Netback + + Status, Linux (netback): Supported + Status, FreeBSD (netback): Supported + +Host-side implementations of Xen PV network protocol + +### Xen Framebuffer + + Status, Linux: Supported + Status, QEMU: Supported + +Host-side implementaiton of the Xen PV framebuffer protocol + +### Xen Console (xenconsoled) + + Status: Supported + +Host-side implementation of the Xen PV console protocol + +### Xen PV keyboard + + Status, QEMU: Supported + +Host-side implementation fo the Xen PV keyboard protocol + +### Xen PV USB + + Status, Linux: Experimental + Status, QEMU: Supported + +Host-side implementation of the Xen PV USB protocol + +### Xen PV SCSI protocol + + Status, Linux: Supported, with caveats + +NB that while the pvSCI backend is in Linux and tested regularly, +there is currently no xl support. + +### Xen PV TPM + + Status: Tech Preview + +### Xen 9pfs + + Status, QEMU: Tech Preview + +### PVCalls + + Status, Linux: Tech Preview + +### Online resize of virtual disks + + Status: Supported + +## Security + +### Driver Domains + + Status: Supported + +### Device Model Stub Domains + + Status: Supported, with caveats + +Vulnerabilities of a device model stub domain to a hostile driver domain are excluded from security support. + +### KCONFIG Expert + + Status: Experimental + +### Live Patching + + Status, x86: Supported + Status, ARM: Experimental + +Compile time disabled + +### Virtual Machine Introspection + + Status, x86: Supported, not security supported + +### XSM & FLASK + + Status: Experimental + +Compile time disabled + +### XSM & FLASK support for IS_PRIV + + Status: Experimental + +Compile time disabled + +## Hardware + +### x86/Nested PV + + Status, x86 HVM: Tech Preview + +This means running a Xen hypervisor inside an HVM domain, +with support for PV L2 guests only +(i.e., hardware virtualization extensions not provided +to the guest). + +This works, but has performance limitations +because the L1 dom0 can only access emulated L1 devices. + +### x86/Nested HVM + + Status, x86 HVM: Experimental + +This means running a Xen hypervisor inside an HVM domain, +with support for running both PV and HVM L2 guests +(i.e., hardware virtualization extensions provided +to the guest). + +### x86/HVM iPXE + + Status: Supported, with caveats + +Booting a guest via PXE. +PXE inherently places full trust of the guest in the network, +and so should only be used +when the guest network is under the same administrative control +as the guest itself. + +### x86/HVM BIOS + + Status: Supported + +Booting a guest via guest BIOS firmware + +### x86/HVM EFI + + Status: Supported + +Booting a guest via guest EFI firmware + +### x86/Physical CPU Hotplug + + Status: Supported + +### x86/Physical Memory Hotplug + + Status: Supported + +### x86/PCI Passthrough PV + + Status: Supported, Not security supported + +PV passthrough cannot be done safely. + +[XXX Not even with an IOMMU?] + +### x86/PCI Passthrough HVM + + Status: Supported, with caveats + +Many hardware device and motherboard combinations are not possible to use safely. +The XenProject will support bugs in PCI passthrough for Xen, +but the user is responsible to ensure that the hardware combination they use +is sufficiently secure for their needs, +and should assume that any combination is insecure +unless they have reason to believe otherwise. + +### ARM/Non-PCI device passthrough + + Status: Supported + +### x86/Advanced Vector eXtension + + Status: Supported + +### vPMU + + Status, x86: Supported, Not security supported + +Virtual Performance Management Unit for HVM guests + +Disabled by default (enable with hypervisor command line option). +This feature is not security supported: see http://xenbits.xen.org/xsa/advisory-163.html + +### Intel Platform QoS Technologies + + Status: Tech Preview + +### ARM/ACPI (host) + + Status: Experimental + +### ARM/SMMUv1 + + Status: Supported + +### ARM/SMMUv2 + + Status: Supported + +### ARM/GICv3 ITS + + Status: Experimental + +Extension to the GICv3 interrupt controller to support MSI. + +### ARM: 16K and 64K pages in guests + + Status: Supported, with caveats + +No support for QEMU backends in a 16K or 64K domain. + +[XXX Need to go through include/public hypercalls to look for more features] + +# Format and definitions + +This file contains prose, and machine-readable fragments. +The data in a machine-readable fragment relate to +the section and subsection in which it is found. + +The file is in markdown format. +The machine-readable fragments are markdown literals +containing RFC-822-like (deb822-like) data. + +## Keys found in the Feature Support subsections + +### Status + +This gives the overall status of the feature, +including security support status, functional completeness, etc. +Refer to the detailed definitions below. + +If support differs based on implementation +(for instance, x86 / ARM, Linux / QEMU / FreeBSD), +one line for each set of implementations will be listed. + +### Restrictions + +This is a summary of any restrictions which apply, +particularly to functional or security support. + +Full details of restrictions may be provided in the prose +section of the feature entry, +if a Restrictions tag is present. + +### Limit-Security + +For size limits. +This figure shows the largest configuration which will receive +security support. +This does not mean that such a configuration will actually work. +This limit will only be listed explicitly +if it is different than the theoretical limit. + +### Limit + +This figure shows a theoretical size limit. +This does not mean that such a large configuration will actually work. + +## Definition of Status labels + +Each Status value corresponds to levels of security support, +testing, stability, etc., as follows: + +### Experimental + + Functional completeness: No + Functional stability: Here be dragons + Interface stability: Not stable + Security supported: No + +### Tech Preview + + Functional completeness: Yes + Functional stability: Quirky + Interface stability: Provisionally stable + Security supported: No + +#### Supported + + Functional completeness: Yes + Functional stability: Normal + Interface stability: Yes + Security supported: Yes + +#### Deprecated + + Functional completeness: Yes + Functional stability: Quirky + Interface stability: No (as in, may disappear the next release) + Security supported: Yes + +All of these may appear in modified form. There are several +interfaces, for instance, which are officially declared as not stable; +in such a case this feature may be described as "Stable / Interface +not stable". + +## Definition of the status label interpretation tags + +### Functionally complete + +Does it behave like a fully functional feature? +Does it work on all expected platforms, +or does it only work for a very specific sub-case? +Does it have a sensible UI, +or do you have to have a deep understanding of the internals +to get it to work properly? + +### Functional stability + +What is the risk of it exhibiting bugs? + +General answers to the above: + + * **Here be dragons** + + Pretty likely to still crash / fail to work. + Not recommended unless you like life on the bleeding edge. + + * **Quirky** + + Mostly works but may have odd behavior here and there. + Recommended for playing around or for non-production use cases. + + * **Normal** + + Ready for production use + +### Interface stability + +If I build a system based on the current interfaces, +will they still work when I upgrade to the next version? + + * **Not stable** + + Interface is still in the early stages and + still fairly likely to be broken in future updates. + + * **Provisionally stable** + + We're not yet promising backwards compatibility, + but we think this is probably the final form of the interface. + It may still require some tweaks. + + * **Stable** + + We will try very hard to avoid breaking backwards compatibility, + and to fix any regressions that are reported. + +### Security supported + +Will XSAs be issued if security-related bugs are discovered +in the functionality? + +If "no", +anyone who finds a security-related bug in the feature +will be advised to +post it publicly to the Xen Project mailing lists +(or contact another security response team, +if a relevant one exists). + +Bugs found after the end of **Security-Support-Until** +in the Release Support section will receive an XSA +if they also affect newer, security-supported, versions of Xen. +However, +the Xen Project will not provide official fixes +for non-security-supported versions. + +Three common 'diversions' from the 'Supported' category +are given the following labels: + + * **Supported, Not security supported** + + Functionally complete, normal stability, + interface stable, but no security support + + * **Supported, Security support external** + + This feature is security supported + by a different organization (not the XenProject). + See **External security support** below. + + * **Supported, with caveats** + + This feature is security supported only under certain conditions, + or support is given only for certain aspects of the feature, + or the feature should be used with care + because it is easy to use insecurely without knowing it. + Additional details will be given in the description. + +### Interaction with other features + +Not all features interact well with all other features. +Some features are only for HVM guests; some don't work with migration, &c. + +### External security support + +The XenProject security team +provides security support for XenProject projects. + +We also provide security support for Xen-related code in Linux, +which is an external project but doesn't have its own security process. + +External projects that provide their own security support for Xen-related features are listed below. + + * QEMU https://wiki.qemu.org/index.php/SecurityProcess + + * Libvirt https://libvirt.org/securityprocess.html + + * FreeBSD https://www.freebsd.org/security/ + + * NetBSD http://www.netbsd.org/support/security/ + + * OpenBSD https://www.openbsd.org/security.html + + -- 2.14.1 _______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@xxxxxxxxxxxxx https://lists.xen.org/xen-devel
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