- Unikraft is a library operating system and development kit that allows building specialized unikernels to reduce the bloat of traditional virtual machines and containers. - Unikraft aims to address barriers to unikernel adoption like performance issues, limited application support, lack of framework integration and debugging tools. - The presentation outlines Unikraft's approach to optimization, POSIX compatibility, supported platforms and libraries, and tools for seamless deployment, monitoring and debugging of unikernels.

1. It’s Time to Debloat the Cloud with Unikraft
Dr. Felipe Huici - CEO &Co-Founder Unikraft GmbH

2. The Private/Public Cloud
Extremely bloated
On all/most of the time
Bad for the
environment
Great scalability
Easy to use
Multitude of services
Cloud 1.0

3. The Private/Public Cloud
Bloated
Expensive
Not eco-friendly
Great scalability
Easy to use
Multitude of services
Cloud 1.0 Current

4. Good for massive cloud providers ...

5. Good for massive cloud providers ...
...and hardware manufacturers...

6. Good for massive cloud providers ...
...and hardware manufacturers...
...but not for most everyone else:

7. Your App
The Bloat Problem (pt.1)

8. Comprised
of...
Your App
Business Logic
The Bloat Problem (pt.1)

9. Comprised
of...
Operating system
Your App
System libraries
System services
Business Logic
The Bloat Problem (pt.1)

10. Comprised
of...
Your App
Unused Operating System
Unused libraries
Unused services
Business Logic
The Bloat Problem (pt.1)

11. Comprised
of...
Your App
Unused Operating System
Unused libraries
Unused services
Business Logic
The Bloat Problem (pt.1)

12. Time
t=0
The Bloat Problem (pt.2)

13. Time
t=0
idle
The Bloat Problem (pt.2)

14. Time
t=0
idle active
The Bloat Problem (pt.2)
req

15. Time
t=0
idle active idle
The Bloat Problem (pt.2)
req

16. Time
t=0
idle active active
idle idle
The Bloat Problem (pt.2)
req req

17. Time
t=0
idle active active
idle idle
The Bloat Problem (pt.2)
req req

18. Time
t=0
idle active active
idle idle
The Bloat Problem (pt.2)
req req

19. You only ever want an espresso
You’re running a full café
Problem
Solution

20. Specialization

21. Specialization Virtual Machines
+

22. Specialization Virtual Machines
+
Unikernels
=

23. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
Unikernels in a Nuts hell
Web server

24. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
Unikernels in a Nuts hell
Web server
3rd party
libraries

25. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
Unikernels in a Nuts hell
Web server
3rd party
libraries
OS
services

26. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
Unikernels in a Nuts hell
Web server
General Purpose OS (e.g., Linux)
3rd party
libraries
OS
services
OS
kernel

27. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
Unikernels in a Nuts hell
Web server
General Purpose OS (e.g., Linux)
3rd party
libraries
OS
services
OS
kernel

28. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
Unikernels in a Nuts hell
Web server
General Purpose OS (e.g., Linux)
3rd party
libraries
OS
services
OS
kernel
Web server
Unikernel

29. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
Unikernels in a Nuts hell
Web server
General Purpose OS (e.g., Linux)
3rd party
libraries
OS
services
OS
kernel
Web server
Unikernel
Lots of devel time!

30. Toolkit to Easily Build,
Deploy and Monitor Unikernels

31. 1. Library operating system and unikernel development kit
2. Well-defined APIs
3. Target POSIX compatibility
4. Target seamless integration with existing frameworks
The Unikraft Model

38. 20-50% cheaper in some of our tests on AWS

39. Why aren’t unikernels
widely deployed?

40. 1. Performance
2. Application &platform support
3. Framework integration
4 . Debugging
Barriers to Deployment

41. 1. Performance
2. Application &platform support
3. Framework integration
4 . Debugging
Barriers to Deployment

42. 1. Performance
a. Small but still monolithic
b. Underperforming code
c. “Slow” languages
Barriers to Deployment

43. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
Unikraft provides better performance
On Unikraft, 82% of increase compared to Docker (NGINX throughput)

44. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
Unikraft provides better memory cons umption and s torage
Image Size
docker.io/nginx:1.15.6 42.62 MB
unikraft.io/nginx:1.15.6 1.3 MB
Memory Usage Disk Space

45. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
Unikraft Boot Time s

46. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
Unikraft offers better optimization

47. 1. Performance
2. Application &platform support
a. Language-specific unikernels
b. Application porting required
c. Insufficient syscall support
3. Framework integration
4 . Debugging
Barriers to Deployment

48. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
What Unikraft Supports (Sample)
(ongoing)

49. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
POSIX Compatibility - Binary Mode

50. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
POSIX Compatibility - Binary Mode

51. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
POSIX Compatibility - Binary Mode

52. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
POSIX Compatibility - Binary Mode

53. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
POSIX Compatibility - Source/Mus l (WiP)

54. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
POSIX Compatibility - Source/Mus l (WiP)

55. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
POSIX Compatibility - Source/Mus l (WiP)

56. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
Platform (and libc) Support
arch:
hyper:
libc: nolibc

57. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
Platform (and libc) Support
arch:
hyper:
libc: nolibc newlib

58. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
Platform (and libc) Support
arch:
hyper:
libc: nolibc newlib

59. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
Platform (and libc) Support
arch:
hyper:
libc: nolibc newlib

60. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
Platform (and libc) Support
arch:
hyper:
libc: nolibc newlib

61. +

62. +
+

63. +

64. +

65. Barriers to Deployment
1. Performance
2. Application &platform support
3. Framework integration
a. Inexistent standard frameworks
b. Missing toolkits
4 . Debugging

66. Seamles s Deployment &
Integration
Kubernetes
kraft Prometheus
Easily build your
unikraft unikernel
Deploy extremely
efficient Unikraft
images seamless
against your
Kubernetes cluster
Monitor your
Unikraft instances
through a standard
and state-of-the-art
monitoring platform
VSCode
Easy development
on the most popular
IDE platform
🚀🚀

67. Seamles s Deployment &
Integration
Kubernetes
kraft Prometheus
Easily build your
unikraft unikernel
Deploy extremely
efficient Unikraft
images seamless
against your
Kubernetes cluster
Monitor your
Unikraft instances
through a standard
and state-of-the-art
monitoring platform
VSCode
Easy development
on the most popular
IDE platform
🚀🚀

69. Seamles s Deployment &
Integration
Kubernetes
kraft Prometheus
Easily build your
unikraft unikernel
Deploy extremely
efficient Unikraft
images seamless
against your
Kubernetes cluster
Monitor your
Unikraft instances
through a standard
and state-of-the-art
monitoring platform
VSCode
Easy development
on the most popular
IDE platform
🚀🚀

70. Copyright © Unikraft UG.
kraft
● Easily manage multiple libraries
from different sources
● Quickly access updates and
change between versions
● Automatically download
application source
dependencies

72. Seamles s Deployment &
Integration
Kubernetes
kraft Prometheus
Easily build your
unikraft unikernel
Deploy extremely
efficient Unikraft
images seamless
against your
Kubernetes cluster
Monitor your
Unikraft instances
through a standard
and state-of-the-art
monitoring platform
VSCode
Easy development
on the most popular
IDE platform
🚀🚀

74. Seamles s Deployment &
Integration
Kubernetes
kraft Prometheus
Easily build your
unikraft unikernel
Deploy extremely
efficient Unikraft
images seamless
against your
Kubernetes cluster
Monitor your
Unikraft instances
through a standard
and state-of-the-art
monitoring platform
VSCode
Easy development
on the most popular
IDE platform
🚀🚀

75. Unikraft Prometheus Exporter + Grafana Dashboard

76. Barriers to Deployment
1. Performance
2. Application &platform support
3. Framework integration
4 . Debugging
a. No standard tools (e.g., gdb)
b. No profiling tools
c. Poor or no documentation

77. Monitoring &Debugging Features
● ukdebug
○ Logging/Print system
○ Assertions
○ Tracepoints
○ GDB server

78. Monitoring &Debugging Features
● ukdebug
○ Logging/Print system
○ Assertions
○ Tracepoints
○ GDB server
● ukt e s t
○ Unit Testing

79. Monitoring &Debugging Features
● ukdebug
○ Logging/Print system
○ Assertions
○ Tracepoints
○ GDB server
● ukt e s t
○ Unit Testing
● uks t or e
○ Directory of library getters and setters

80. Monitoring &Debugging Features
● ukdebug
○ Logging/Print system
○ Assertions
○ Tracepoints
○ GDB server
● ukt e s t
○ Unit Testing
● uks t or e
○ Directory of library getters and setters
● uni pr of ( t ool )
○ Performance analysis with stack snapshots

81. Unikraft Documentation

82. Security

83. ● Compile-time specialization strategy
● Minimal Trusted Computing Base (TCB
● Immutable
● Default off: no unnecessary open ports, daemons,
sshd, etc.
Intrins ic Security Features

87. Unikraft Linux Foundation Project

89. https ://bit.ly/UnikraftDis cord

90. + Romanian (yearly) Hackathon – September
+ UK Hackathon – Fall
+ Asian Hackathon – Spring
+ Your Hackathon here!!

92. The Lightweight Virtualization Company
https://github.com/unikraft/unikraft
https://unikraft.io
@UnikraftSDK
<info@unikraft.io>

93. The Lightweight Virtualization Company
https://github.com/unikraft/unikraft
https://unikraft.io
@UnikraftSDK
<info@unikraft.io>
Pleas e
Star us on
GitHub!