vmkit/www/index.html - llvm-archive - Git at Google

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   <title>VMKit: a substrate for virtual machines</title>
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   <!--*********************************************************************-->
   <h1>VMKit: a substrate for virtual machines</h1>
   <!--*********************************************************************-->

   <p>The VMKit project is a framework for building virtual machines. It uses
   <a href="http://llvm.org">LLVM</a> for compiling and optimizing high-level
   languages to machine code, and <a href="http://jikesrvm.org/MMTk">MMTk</a>
   to manage memory. J3 is an implementation of a JVM with VMKit.
   You can <a href="get_started.html">get and build</a> the source of J3
   today.</p>

   <!--=====================================================================-->
   <h2 id="goals">Features</h2>
   <!--=====================================================================-->

   <p>VMKit provides the following features:</p>

   <p><b>End-User Features</a></b>:</p>

   <ul>
   <li>Precise garbage collection.</li>
   <li>Just-in-Time and Ahead-of-Time compilation.</li>
   <li>Portable on many architectures (x86, x64, ppc32, ppc64, arm).</li>
   </ul>

   <p><b>Developer Features</a></b>:</p>

   <ul>
     <li>Relatively small code base (~ 20k loc per VM)</li>
     <li>Infrastructure for running multiple VM/applications in a single
         process</li>
     <li>Infrastructure for virtual machine research and development</li>
   </ul>

   <!--=====================================================================-->
   <h2>Why?</h2>
   <!--=====================================================================-->

   <p>The development of VMKit was started out of a need to factorize virtual
      machine development. The JVM and CLI virtual machine have many
      similarities, but are too high-level to be the basis of a "universal"
      virtual machine. The LLVM IR on the opposite is low-level enough to be
      able to execute these VMs. VMKit is a proof of concept implementation
      towards that direction.</p>

   <p>Paper on the design of VMKit:
   <ul>
     <li><a href="publications/vmkit.html">VMKit: a Substrate for Managed Runtime Environments</a>
     </li>
   </ul>

   <p>The PhD thesis that initiated VMKit:
   <ul>
     <li><a href="publications/thesis.html">Nicolas Geoffray's PhD thesis</a>
     </li>
   </ul>

   <p>An introduction to VMKit can be found in the following video lectures:
   <ul>
     <li><a href="http://llvm.org/devmtg/2009-10/Geoffray_GarbageCollectionVMKit-700kbps.mov">
         Presentation of VMKit/MMTk at the 2009 LLVM Developer's Meeting</a>
     </li>
     <li><a href="http://llvm.org/devmtg/2008-08/Geoffray_VMKitProject_Lo.3gp">
         Presentation of VMKit at the 2008 LLVM Developer's Meeting</a>
     </li>
   </ul>
   </p>

   <!--=====================================================================-->
   <h2>Current Status</h2>
   <!--=====================================================================-->

   <p>VMKit currently has a decent implementation of a JVM. It executes
      large projects (e.g. OSGi Felix, Tomcat, Eclipse) and the
      <a href="http://dacapobench.org">DaCapo benchmarks</a>.
   </p>

   <p>The JVM has been tested on Linux/x64, Linux/x86, Linux/ppc32, MacOSX/x64,
      MacOSX/x86, MacOSX/ppc32. The JVM may work on ppc64. Support for
      Windows has not been investigated.
   </p>


   <!--=====================================================================-->
   <h2>Get it and get involved!</h2>
   <!--=====================================================================-->

   <p>Start by <a href="get_started.html">getting the code, building it, and
      playing with it</a>.  This will show you the sorts of things we can do
      today.</p>

   <p>Once you've done that, please consider <a href="get_involved.html">getting
      involved in the VMKit community</a>. Currently, VMKit is tightly
      integrated into the LLVM community. You can sign up for the LLVM mailing
      list to ask and learn about how the project works.</p>
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	<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01//EN"
	"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd">
	<!-- Material used from: HTML 4.01 specs: http://www.w3.org/TR/html401/ -->
	<html>
	<head>
	<META http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1" />
	<title>VMKit: a substrate for virtual machines</title>
	<link type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" href="menu.css" />
	<link type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" href="content.css" />
	</head>
	<body>
	<!--#include virtual="menu.html.incl"-->
	<div id="content">
	<!--*********************************************************************-->
	<h1>VMKit: a substrate for virtual machines</h1>
	<!--*********************************************************************-->

	<p>The VMKit project is a framework for building virtual machines. It uses
	<a href="http://llvm.org">LLVM</a> for compiling and optimizing high-level
	languages to machine code, and <a href="http://jikesrvm.org/MMTk">MMTk</a>
	to manage memory. J3 is an implementation of a JVM with VMKit.
	You can <a href="get_started.html">get and build</a> the source of J3
	today.</p>

	<!--=====================================================================-->
	<h2 id="goals">Features</h2>
	<!--=====================================================================-->

	<p>VMKit provides the following features:</p>

	<p><b>End-User Features</a></b>:</p>

	<ul>
	<li>Precise garbage collection.</li>
	<li>Just-in-Time and Ahead-of-Time compilation.</li>
	<li>Portable on many architectures (x86, x64, ppc32, ppc64, arm).</li>
	</ul>

	<p><b>Developer Features</a></b>:</p>

	<ul>
	<li>Relatively small code base (~ 20k loc per VM)</li>
	<li>Infrastructure for running multiple VM/applications in a single
	process</li>
	<li>Infrastructure for virtual machine research and development</li>
	</ul>

	<!--=====================================================================-->
	<h2>Why?</h2>
	<!--=====================================================================-->

	<p>The development of VMKit was started out of a need to factorize virtual
	machine development. The JVM and CLI virtual machine have many
	similarities, but are too high-level to be the basis of a "universal"
	virtual machine. The LLVM IR on the opposite is low-level enough to be
	able to execute these VMs. VMKit is a proof of concept implementation
	towards that direction.</p>

	<p>Paper on the design of VMKit:
	<ul>
	<li><a href="publications/vmkit.html">VMKit: a Substrate for Managed Runtime Environments</a>
	</li>
	</ul>

	<p>The PhD thesis that initiated VMKit:
	<ul>
	<li><a href="publications/thesis.html">Nicolas Geoffray's PhD thesis</a>
	</li>
	</ul>

	<p>An introduction to VMKit can be found in the following video lectures:
	<ul>
	<li><a href="http://llvm.org/devmtg/2009-10/Geoffray_GarbageCollectionVMKit-700kbps.mov">
	Presentation of VMKit/MMTk at the 2009 LLVM Developer's Meeting</a>
	</li>
	<li><a href="http://llvm.org/devmtg/2008-08/Geoffray_VMKitProject_Lo.3gp">
	Presentation of VMKit at the 2008 LLVM Developer's Meeting</a>
	</li>
	</ul>
	</p>

	<!--=====================================================================-->
	<h2>Current Status</h2>
	<!--=====================================================================-->

	<p>VMKit currently has a decent implementation of a JVM. It executes
	large projects (e.g. OSGi Felix, Tomcat, Eclipse) and the
	<a href="http://dacapobench.org">DaCapo benchmarks</a>.
	</p>

	<p>The JVM has been tested on Linux/x64, Linux/x86, Linux/ppc32, MacOSX/x64,
	MacOSX/x86, MacOSX/ppc32. The JVM may work on ppc64. Support for
	Windows has not been investigated.
	</p>


	<!--=====================================================================-->
	<h2>Get it and get involved!</h2>
	<!--=====================================================================-->

	<p>Start by <a href="get_started.html">getting the code, building it, and
	playing with it</a>. This will show you the sorts of things we can do
	today.</p>

	<p>Once you've done that, please consider <a href="get_involved.html">getting
	involved in the VMKit community</a>. Currently, VMKit is tightly
	integrated into the LLVM community. You can sign up for the LLVM mailing
	list to ask and learn about how the project works.</p>
	</div>
	</body>
	</html>