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note snabb switch support

**Contents** [[!toc levels=2]] # The Anykernel and Rump Kernels ## About A driver abstracts an underlying entity. For example, a TCP/IP driver abstracts the details required to perform networking, the Fast File System (FFS) driver abstracts how the file system blocks are laid out on the storage medium, and a PCI network card driver abstracts how to access device registers to send and receive packets. The kernel architecture controls how kernel drivers run with respect to other system components. Some examples of kernel architectures are the monolithic kernel, microkernel and exokernel. In contrast to the above architectures, NetBSD is an *anykernel*. This means that some kernel drivers can be run according to any kernel architecture instead of being limited to a single one.  When a driver is not run as part of the monolithic kernel, e.g. when it is run as a microkernel style server, the driver is hosted in a *rump kernel*. A rump kernel is an ultralightweight virtualized kernel running on top of high-level hypercall interface. Instead of a low-level hypercall API typically seen with operating systems with operations such as "modify page table", the rump kernel hypercall API provides high-level operations such as "run this code in a thread". Currently, three implementations of the rump kernel hypercall interface exist. - The POSIX implementation is included in the NetBSD tree and allows rump kernels to run as userspace processes on most operating systems such as NetBSD, Linux and Solaris. - The Xen implementation allows running rump kernels directly as Xen DomU's without an intermediate operating system. - The Linux kernel hypervisor allows rump kernels to run inside the Linux kernel. Rump kernels are radically different from OS virtualization technologies such as KVM, containers and usermode operating systems. A rump kernel does not support hosting application processes because a rump kernel is aimed at virtualizing kernel drivers and application virtualization would be pure overhead. Instead, existing entities such as processes from a hosting OS are used as clients for the rump kernel ("application" in the figure). As a result of the above design choices, rump kernels are extremely lightweight. The bootstrap time for rump kernels on POSIX hosts is measured in milliseconds and memory footprint in 100kB's. This means that a rump kernel can be bootstrapped for example as part of a command line tool for virtually no cost or user impact. Rump kernels also mandate very little from the hypercall implementation meaning that rump kernels, and by extension NetBSD kernel drivers, can be hosted in virtually any environment -- for example, rump kernels do not require a platform with an MMU. Use cases for rump kernels include: - **Code reuse**: kernel drivers can be reused without having to run a whole OS. For example, a full-featured TCP/IP stack (IPv6, IPSec, etc.) can be included in an embedded appliance without having to write the stack from scratch or waste resources on running an entire OS. - **Kernel driver virtualization**: every rump kernel has its own state. Furthermore, the functionality offered by multiple rump kernels running on the same host does not need to be equal. For example, multiple different networking stacks optimized for different purposes are possible. - **Security**: when hosted on a POSIX system, a rump kernel runs in its own instance of a userspace process. For example, it is widely published that file system drivers are vulnerable to untrusted file system images. Unlike on other general purpose operating systems, on NetBSD it is possible to mount untrusted file systems, such as those on a USB stick, in an isolated server with the kernel file system driver. This isolates attacks and prevents kernel compromises while not requiring to maintain separate userspace implementations of the file system drivers or use other resource-intensive approaches such as virtual machines. - **Easy prototyping and development**: kernel code can be developed as a normal userspace application. Once development is finished, the code can simply be complied into the kernel. This is a much more convenient and straightforward approach to kernel development than the use of virtual machines. - **Safe testing**: kernel code can be tested in userspace on any host without risk of the test host being affected. Again, virtual machines are not required. ## Further Reading ### Book The following book is the definitive guide to the anykernel and rump kernels and supercedes all earlier publications and terminology on the subject. - [Flexible Operating System Internals: The Design and Implementation of the Anykernel and Rump Kernels](http://lib.tkk.fi/Diss/2012/isbn9789526049175/isbn9789526049175.pdf) Note that the book was finalized in summer 2012, so while the fundamentals are still accurate, some of the problems described in "Future Work" have already been solved. Check out the links below. ### Software using rump kernels While the NetBSD source tree hosts the base kernel drivers and hypercall implementation, more I/O drivers, infrastructure scripts and hypercall implementations are hosted elsewhere. Most of the code is hosted under the [rump kernels](https://github.com/rumpkernel/) organization on github. Some highlights include: - [Scripts for building rump kernels for POSIX systems](https://github.com/rumpkernel/buildrump.sh) - The [rumprun](https://github.com/rumpkernel/rumprun/) package allows portable building and running of unmodified NetBSD userspace applications -- extremely useful for configuring rump kernels (e.g. network interfaces and routing tables) - [Rump kernel hypercall implementation for Xen; rump kernels as Xen DomU's](https://github.com/rumpkernel/rumpuser-xen) - [fs-utils: File system image access utilities](https://github.com/stacktic/fs-utils) - Fast userspace packet processing: TCP/IP stack for use with [DPDK](https://github.com/rumpkernel/dpdk-rumptcpip), [netmap](https://github.com/rumpkernel/netmap-rumptcpip) or [Snabb Switch](https://github.com/anttikantee/snabbswitch/tree/rumpkernel/) ### Articles, Tutorials & Howtos - [Running rump kernels and applications on Xen without a full OS](http://blog.NetBSD.org/tnf/entry/running_applications_on_the_xen) - [PCI device driver support in rump kernels on Xen](http://blog.NetBSD.org/tnf/entry/pci_driver_support_for_rump) - [Experiment with a rump kernel hypervisor for the Linux kernel](http://blog.NetBSD.org/tnf/entry/a_rump_kernel_hypervisor_for) (allows rump kernels to run *in* the Linux kernel) - [Experiment on compiling rump kernels to javascript and running them in the browser](http://blog.NetBSD.org/tnf/entry/kernel_drivers_compiled_to_javascript) - [Kernel Servers using Rump](http://www.NetBSD.org/docs/rump/sysproxy.html) - [Tutorial On Rump Kernel Servers and Clients](http://www.NetBSD.org/docs/rump/sptut.html) - [Revolutionizing Kernel Development: Testing With Rump](http://blog.NetBSD.org/tnf/entry/revolutionizing_kernel_development_testing_with) ### Conference publications and talks - "The Anykernel and Rump Kernels" gives a general overview and demonstrates rump kernels on Windows and in Firefox. The [video](http://video.fosdem.org/2013/maintracks/K.1.105/The_Anykernel_and_Rump_Kernels.webm), [slides](https://fosdem.org/2013/schedule/event/operating_systems_anykernel/attachments/slides/244/export/events/attachments/operating_systems_anykernel/slides/244/fosdem2013_rumpkern.pdf) and an [interview](https://archive.fosdem.org/2013/interviews/2013-antii-kantee/) are available. Presented at FOSDEM 2013 (Operating Systems track). - "Rump Device Drivers: Shine On You Kernel Diamond" describes device driver and USB. The [paper](http://ftp.NetBSD.org/pub/NetBSD/misc/pooka/tmp/rumpdev.pdf) and [video presentation](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3AJNxa33pzk) are available. Presented at AsiaBSDCon 2010. - "Fs-utils: File Systems Access Tools for Userland" describes fs-utils, an mtools-like utility kit which uses rump kernel file systems as a backend. The [paper](http://www.ukuug.org/events/eurobsdcon2009/papers/ebc09_fs-utils.pdf) is available. Presented at EuroBSDCon 2009. - "Rump File Systems: Kernel Code Reborn" describes kernel file system code and its uses in userspace. The [paper](http://usenix.org/events/usenix09/tech/full_papers/kantee/kantee.pdf) and [slides](http://usenix.org/events/usenix09/tech/slides/kantee.pdf) are available. Presented at the 2009 USENIX Annual Technical Conference. - "Kernel Development in Userspace - The Rump Approach" describes doing kernel development with rump kernels. The [paper](http://www.bsdcan.org/2009/schedule/attachments/104_rumpdevel.pdf) and [slides](http://www.bsdcan.org/2009/schedule/attachments/105_bsdcan09-kantee.pdf) are available. Presented at BSDCan 2009. - "Environmental Independence: BSD Kernel TCP/IP in Userspace" describes networking in rump kernels. The [paper](http://2009.asiabsdcon.org/papers/abc2009-P5A-paper.pdf) and [video presentation](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxFctq8A0WI) are available. Presented at AsiaBSDCon 2009. ### Manual pages The manpages provide the usual type of information. Start from [rump.3](http://man.NetBSD.org/cgi-bin/man-cgi?rump++NetBSD-current) and follow the cross-references in "SEE ALSO". ## Discuss Any topic related to rump kernels can be discussed on the [rumpkernel-users mailing list](https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/rumpkernel-users). Alternatively, you can use a NetBSD mailing which is related to a specific subtopic. The IRC channel for rump kernels is **\#rumpkernel** on **irc.freenode.net**. ## Availability The anykernel and rump kernels were first introduced as a prototype in NetBSD 5.0. A stable version with numerous new features and improvements was shipped with NetBSD 6.0. ## Source Code All of the source code is available from the NetBSD source tree and can be obtained with the usual methods. You can also [browse](http://cvsweb.NetBSD.org/bsdweb.cgi/src/) the source code history online. Code is found from all areas of the source tree. Some examples of where to look include [src/lib](http://cvsweb.NetBSD.org/bsdweb.cgi/src/lib/), [src/usr.bin](http://cvsweb.NetBSD.org/bsdweb.cgi/src/usr.bin/) and [src/sys/rump](http://cvsweb.NetBSD.org/bsdweb.cgi/src/sys/rump/).