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authorKeir Fraser <keir.fraser@citrix.com>2008-08-28 09:49:52 +0100
committerKeir Fraser <keir.fraser@citrix.com>2008-08-28 09:49:52 +0100
commit85a85762175eb5aa305d58892d950b413f97cc08 (patch)
treee45cb999711096d2b8ede83470dd6b26e2e81b91 /docs
parent309af15419b92fcc3766dc7060fbe269b6238a54 (diff)
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docs: Update user manual for 3.3.
From: Stephen Spector <stephen.spector@citrix.com> Signed-off-by: Keir Fraser <keir.fraser@citrix.com>
Diffstat (limited to 'docs')
-rw-r--r--docs/src/user.tex69
1 files changed, 28 insertions, 41 deletions
diff --git a/docs/src/user.tex b/docs/src/user.tex
index 59f5a8a9e4..91897fdfbf 100644
--- a/docs/src/user.tex
+++ b/docs/src/user.tex
@@ -22,7 +22,7 @@
\vfill
\begin{tabular}{l}
{\Huge \bf Users' Manual} \\[4mm]
-{\huge Xen v3.0} \\[80mm]
+{\huge Xen v3.3} \\[80mm]
\end{tabular}
\end{center}
@@ -42,9 +42,7 @@ welcome.}
\vspace*{\fill}
-Xen is Copyright \copyright 2002-2005, University of Cambridge, UK, XenSource
-Inc., IBM Corp., Hewlett-Packard Co., Intel Corp., AMD Inc., and others. All
-rights reserved.
+Xen is Copyright \copyright 2002-2008, Citrix Systems, Inc., University of Cambridge, UK, XenSource Inc., IBM Corp., Hewlett-Packard Co., Intel Corp., AMD Inc., and others. All rights reserved.
Xen is an open-source project. Most portions of Xen are licensed for copying
under the terms of the GNU General Public License, version 2. Other portions
@@ -116,16 +114,13 @@ OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.
Xen is an open-source \emph{para-virtualizing} virtual machine monitor
-(VMM), or ``hypervisor'', for the x86 processor architecture. Xen can
-securely execute multiple virtual machines on a single physical system
-with close-to-native performance. Xen facilitates enterprise-grade
-functionality, including:
+(VMM), or ``hypervisor'', for a variety of processor architectures including x86. Xen can securely execute multiple virtual machines on a single physical system with near native performance. Xen facilitates enterprise-grade functionality, including:
\begin{itemize}
\item Virtual machines with performance close to native hardware.
\item Live migration of running virtual machines between physical hosts.
\item Up to 32\footnote{IA64 supports up to 64 virtual CPUs per guest virtual machine} virtual CPUs per guest virtual machine, with VCPU hotplug.
-\item x86/32, x86/32 with PAE, x86/64, IA64 and Power platform support.
+\item x86/32 with PAE, x86/64, and IA64 platform support.
\item Intel and AMD Virtualization Technology for unmodified guest operating systems (including Microsoft Windows).
\item Excellent hardware support (supports almost all Linux device
drivers).
@@ -182,22 +177,20 @@ unmodified guests running natively on the processor.
Paravirtualized Xen support is available for increasingly many
operating systems: currently, mature Linux support is available and
-included in the standard distribution. Other OS ports---including
-NetBSD, FreeBSD and Solaris x86 v10---are nearing completion.
+included in the standard distribution. Other OS ports, including
+NetBSD, FreeBSD and Solaris are also complete.
\section{Hardware Support}
-Xen currently runs on the x86 architecture, requiring a ``P6'' or
-newer processor (e.g.\ Pentium Pro, Celeron, Pentium~II, Pentium~III,
-Pentium~IV, Xeon, AMD~Athlon, AMD~Duron). Multiprocessor machines are
-supported, and there is support for HyperThreading (SMT). In
-addition, ports to IA64 and Power architectures are supported.
+Xen currently runs on the IA64 and x86 architectures. Multiprocessor
+machines are supported, and there is support for HyperThreading (SMT).
-The default 32-bit Xen supports for Intel's Physical Addressing Extensions (PAE), which enable x86/32 machines to address up to 64 GB of physical memory.
-It also supports non-PAE 32-bit Xen up to 4GB of memory.
-Xen also supports x86/64 platforms such as Intel EM64T and AMD Opteron
-which can currently address up to 1TB of physical memory.
+The default 32-bit Xen requires processor support for Physical
+Addressing Extensions (PAE), which enables the hypervisor to address
+up to 16GB of physical memory. Xen also supports x86/64 platforms
+such as Intel EM64T and AMD Opteron which can currently address up to
+1TB of physical memory.
Xen offloads most of the hardware support issues to the guest OS
running in the \emph{Domain~0} management virtual machine. Xen itself
@@ -253,8 +246,8 @@ with pointers to papers and technical reports:
Xen has grown into a fully-fledged project in its own right, enabling us
to investigate interesting research issues regarding the best techniques
for virtualizing resources such as the CPU, memory, disk and network.
-Project contributors now include XenSource, Intel, IBM, HP, AMD, Novell,
-RedHat.
+Project contributors now include Citrix, Intel, IBM, HP, AMD, Novell,
+RedHat, Sun, Fujitsu, and Samsung.
Xen was first described in a paper presented at SOSP in
2003\footnote{\tt
@@ -265,25 +258,20 @@ sites.
\section{What's New}
-Xen 3.0.0 offers:
+Xen 3.3.0 offers:
\begin{itemize}
-\item Support for up to 32-way SMP guest operating systems
-\item Intel (Physical Addressing Extensions) PAE to support 32-bit
- servers with more than 4GB physical memory
-\item x86/64 support (Intel EM64T, AMD Opteron)
-\item Intel VT-x support to enable the running of unmodified guest
-operating systems (Windows XP/2003, Legacy Linux)
-\item Enhanced control tools
-\item Improved ACPI support
-\item AGP/DRM graphics
+\item IO Emulation (stub domains) for HVM IO performance and scailability
+\item Replacement of Intel VT vmxassist by new 16b emulation code
+\item Improved VT-d device pass-through e.g. for graphics devices
+\item Enhanced C and P state power management
+\item Exploitation of multi-queue support on modern NICs
+\item Removal of domain lock for improved PV guest scalability
+\item 2MB page support for HVM and PV guests
+\item CPU Portability
\end{itemize}
-
-Xen 3.0 features greatly enhanced hardware support, configuration
-flexibility, usability and a larger complement of supported operating
-systems. This latest release takes Xen a step closer to being the
-definitive open source solution for virtualization.
+Xen 3.3 delivers the capabilities needed by enterprise customers and gives computing industry leaders a solid, secure platform to build upon for their virtualization solutions. This latest release establishes Xen as the definitive open source solution for virtualization.
@@ -295,7 +283,7 @@ definitive open source solution for virtualization.
The Xen distribution includes three main components: Xen itself, ports
of Linux and NetBSD to run on Xen, and the userspace tools required to
manage a Xen-based system. This chapter describes how to install the
-Xen~3.0 distribution from source. Alternatively, there may be pre-built
+Xen~3.3 distribution from source. Alternatively, there may be pre-built
packages available as part of your operating system distribution.
@@ -4029,9 +4017,8 @@ files: \path{Config.mk} and \path{Makefile}.
The former allows the overall build target architecture to be
specified. You will typically not need to modify this unless
-you are cross-compiling or if you wish to build a non-PAE
-Xen system. Additional configuration options are documented
-in the \path{Config.mk} file.
+you are cross-compiling. Additional configuration options are
+documented in the \path{Config.mk} file.
The top-level \path{Makefile} is chiefly used to customize the set of
kernels built. Look for the line: