"Microsoft Wants To Create A Complete Virtualization Stack With Linux"

[starshipeleven]

As written by tildearrow before I fear too this is EEE...

You guys need to understand what EEE is before screaming and tearing your vests like that.

This is just adding a competitor with KVM and Xen for "Linux virtualization host" role.

[starshipeleven]

Someone should come up with an "Everyone but Oracle" open source license.

Eh, it's better like this, as long as they content themselves by doing some "petty theft" here and there, they don't start going omnomnomnom on other companies like they did with Sun (aka bought everything, then slowly strangled and killed all their products), which is worse.

[starshipeleven]

Will the kernel even merge a stub/wrapper/condom like mshv? I forget where the line is drawn.

This is not a stub/wrapper/condom to use crap within Linux, it's an interface to run Linux as a VM under an hypervisor. With Hyper-V the "root partition" is still technically a VM, but with higher privileges.

So they are just adding functionality to the existing module that allowed Linux to be a "native VM" in Hyper-V (a VM that does not need emulation and is aware of the Hypervisor's interfaces), that is already merged in Linux.

[starshipeleven]

Is Microsoft, with its current leadership, the enemy of open source?

Is Open Source, with its current leadership, the enemy of Microsoft?

[Michael_S]

IMHO definitely not. Times have changed. Microsoft is actively involved in many open source projects (including the Linux kernel itself) and they also do things that are entirely contrary to the FOSS philosophy. Just like, you know, pretty much every major company around. In fact I would say they are now one of the better ones.

I think this is entirely a reaction to market conditions, and as soon as the market changes or Microsoft devises a business model that makes proprietary options more profitable, they will shift away.

Now, it's still completely fine to praise, use, and even contribute to their current open source projects. The fact that they can shift away in the future doesn't mean they can destroy the stuff they already released.

But this move to open source is not, "Microsoft has decided to be less evil", just, "Microsoft realized open source would be more profitable, for the moment."

[starshipeleven]

I'm confused by what this means.

Does this mean that Hyper-V will now support bare-metal booted Linux hosts and we can use Hyper-V instead of KVM, VMware or Xen?

Yes. They are adding functionality to Linux hyper-v subsystem so it can become the "host" of a Hyper-V server. Technically speaking in Hyper-V the "host" is still a VM running on top of the Hyper-V microkernel that remains proprietary, so with this move they are just ditching Windows Server as Hyper-V host system.
See my posts in the first page.

[kpedersen]

Do these patches really benefit Linux and the Linux community?

Why would the kernel tree accept them?

Is it so Microsoft invests many man-years of work, then 10 years later we can rip all Microsoft's stuff out again and giggle?

[CochainComplex]

As written by tildearrow before I fear too this is EEE...

[Jabberwocky]

Old timer here, and I agree.

Microsoft is (and always has been) a monopolist, end they want plaform control.

Nothing changed.

+1 Microsoft wants to run Docker and accelerated-qemu for Android/Xamarin. Yet Microsoft does NOT want Linux to run HyperV even if you run it in a Windows VM in KVM. Microsoft wants you to buy Windows Server $$$ for nested virtualization.

[ossuser]

Microsoft is like China was, when China tried an alternative to tight central planing: "experimental capitalism", for a very short time. Old timers here still distrust Microsoft. Will the big USA brands now also follow the world leader into Computer Technology? Here in Australia, we obediently follow the USA POTUS. No more Huawei, and ignore The Facebook, Google & YourTube censorship of "hate speech", "fake news", and ignore everything not politically correct.
Linux & computing has its politically correct police force. For example Microsoft has its source code supposedly open to Linux coders, via the "Open Invention Network". No press releases seem to come yet. Is this their BRI: Belt and Road Initiative? When The next Emperor Trump runs Microsoft, Microsoft might return to what we old timers remember about it.

Old timer here, and I agree.

Microsoft is (and always has been) a monopolist, end they want plaform control.

Nothing changed.