OVF (Open Virtualization Format) Standard Overview (Part 1)

Středa V 27, 2009

In this Corner I will try to consolidate our knowledge and views to OVF (Open Virtualization Format), new Virtualization standard which promise to deliver cross-platform vendor independent distribution framework

OVF (Open Virtualization Format) Standard Origins

OVF (Open Virtualization Format) is framework originally proposed by VMware & XenSource with contributions from Dell, HP, IBM and Microsoft as neutral standard , later it was accepted as DMTF standard (Released on 23/Mar/2009).

While many public comment then OVF define simple portable Virtual Machines, this is common misinterpretation of OVF, because it try to address address wider area of Virtual Appliances and is part of wider standardization effort called "Virtualization Management (VMAN) Initiative"

OVF Standard Sources

• VMware Sources
  • Man Page: What is OVF?
  • Open Virtualization Format Whitepaper (Older - Larger One)

• DMTF Standard Pages
  • Enabling Portability & Simplified Deployment of Virtual Appliances
  • Open Virtualization Format (OVF) Version 1.0 Published as a DMTF Standard.
  • Virtualization Management (VMAN) Initiative Homepage (OVF amd CIM standards)

• Other Sources
  • Industry players working on standard for VMs (1997)
  • Major Server Builders Opt For a Common Virtualization Standard (They target the "zero configuration virtualization" concept) (1997)
  • Microsoft to Deliver a Platform Agnostic Standard for Virtualization (1997)
  • Open Virtualization Format and virtual appliances (2008)
  • Open Virtual Machine Format to benefit users (2008)
  • A review of (Open Virtual Machine Format) OVF from a systems management perspective (2008)
  • Reviewing DMTF OVF as a “preliminary standard” (2008)
  • OVF in action: Kensho

Reference Implementation Open-OVF

Sometimes OVF Standard and related docs like CMI profiles is difficult to follow up, I use a Open-OVF Open Sourced implementation everywhere I need to get deep implementation ideas

• Open OVF Proposal
• Open-OVF Homepage
• Open-OVF Command Line Interface

Open-OVF is implemented in Python, is developed on/for Linux , but must be easily portable to (Open)Solaris too.

Open-OVF is integrated with other Open Source Virtualization tools like virtlib

SW with OVF support

Most referred SW here was implemented before official OVF 1.0 standard was published.

OVF Tool implementations

• VMware vCenter Converter (Version 3.x is for Windows only, Version 4.x also support Linux)
• VMware OVF tool (Originaly it was Java now it is a Linux/MS Windows tool ?)
• VMware Studio Virtual Appliances creation tool from VMware
• Open-OVF (Don't solve Virtual disk conversions)
• IBM's Open Virtualization Format Toolkit (Need Eclipse)
• Citrix Kensho Project
• Others (Add here)

Note: I often us use Open-OVF as reference implementation.

OVF Import implementations

• VMware ESX 3.5u3 and ESXi 3.5u3 support OVF
• All latest VMware Desktop Versions support OVF and OVA, local and net based
• Sun xVM VirtualBox 2.2.x (OVF only) (Beta 1 , Beta 2 and Pre-RR builds for now)
• Others (add there)

OVF Export implementations

• VMware Workstation 6.5.x (Have Converter Client)
• Sun xVM VirtualBox 2.2.x (Beta 1 for now)

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Posted at 04:34odp. V 27, 2009 by natiku in Virtualization
Tags: ovf virtualbox virtual_appliances vmware