When it comes to running a business on the cloud, companies are constantly looking for new and unique ways to help cheaply and safely store information and run programs.
For that reason, unikernels are starting to become quite popular. Unikernels offer individuals and businesses a way to maximize their productivity from server hardware. While they are not as popular as many other options currently on the market, unikernel supporters are loudly encouraging IT shops to finally start embracing this approach.
What is the goal of unikernels?
If you are new to the topic, you may be wondering what unikernels have really been developed to do. What problems can they solve for those using computers in 2021?
To put it simply, the goal of unikernels is to restructure entire virtual machines – and that includes all kernel and userspace code – and put it into more modular components that are secure, reusable and very flexible. They do this in the style of a library operating system, which is known to be a stripped down and bare-bones operating system. It is like this because it has the minimal number of libraries needed to run a specific application.
All that being said, unikernels are essentially highly specialized and single-address-space machine images that are made from library operating systems. They are built from high-level computing languages that can be compiled into application machine images.
By shrinking down the operating system to only its most essential functions, unikernels are able to help entire applications run smoothly while taking up minimal resources.
Fast and secure
What all this technical language essentially boils down to means that unikernels allow businesses and individuals alike to utilize the programs and applications that they need to access in a fast and safe way.
The reason why unikernels are considered to be so safe is because they have miniscule attack surfaces when compared with virtual machines and popular containers. Because of that, the vast majority of the usual attack surfaces are not even present when it comes to unikernels. This includes things like unused drivers, unnecessary I/O routines as well as unnecessary support libraries.
On top of that, thanks to the fact that they load only the libraries that are required by the application, unikernels are known to boot very quickly. They certainly make the most out of the resources that are available to them compared to containers. Unikernels are also not dependent on complex code in the same way that containers are.
Conclusion
As you can see, there are a lot of fascinating reasons why unikernels are gaining traction when it comes to how companies and individuals gain access to the programs and applications they require on a day to day basis. Ultimately, unikernels work fast because they are able to use the bare minimum to get the job done. This keeps costs low and maintains a high level of security as there are less avenues for potential malware to take hold.
For that reason, it is quite likely that unikernels only continue to grow in popularity going forward.
