Automating the Porting of Linux to the VirtualLogix Hypervisor Using Semantic Patches

Virtualization is a promising technology for running multiple Operating Systems (OS's) on a single processor. Preparing an OS for use with virtualization, however, involves making some changes to the OS code, which must be repeated for each version, whether a new release or a client customization. This paper considers the use of the automated transformation system Coccinelle to perform the changes required to port several versions of Linux to the VLX hypervisor. Coccinelle provides a notion of semantic patches, which are more abstract than standard patches, and thus are potentially applicable to a wider range of OS versions. They have applied this approach in the context of Linux versions 2.6.13, 2.6.14, and 2.6.15, for ARM architecture.