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I never understood why exokernels stalled out; the idea of a kernel simply being a hardware multiplexer sounds great. IMO the problem that will always plauge mi
by nwmcsween 11y ago
I never understood why exokernels stalled out; the idea of a kernel simply being a hardware multiplexer sounds great. IMO the problem that will always plauge microkernels is the overhead of context switching and from a technical standpoint it just seems like a waste of cycles considering the possible alternative. The alternative I would want to see is an exokernel with a data driven api, possible batching, some form of scheduler activations and proof carrying code to allow loading of 'modules' from unprivledged userspace. The issues would be 'syscall' time could vary greatly depending on what was requested and logic to optimize what a call actually has to do would have to be within the kernel.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- nostrademons 11y agoThey didn't, the technology just got renamed "virtualization" when people realized that if all the kernel does is multiplex the hardware, its API might as well look like the hardware too. Modern hypervisors are basically exokernels; it's a multibillion-dollar business that's a lot more successful than any microkernel has ever been.
- Rusky 11y agoIn addition to nostrademons' point about virtualization, exokernels have influenced monolithic kernels in particular situations. For example, the Linux kernel's graphics stack is moving away from rendering through the X server, towards directly rendering into a buffer using libraries (Wayland is only the most recent step in this direction).