Chapter 1. Introduction
1.1. Introduction to Red Hat Virtualization
Red Hat Virtualization is an enterprise-grade server and desktop virtualization platform built on Red Hat Enterprise Linux. There are three core components to a Red Hat Virtualization environment:
- Red Hat Virtualization Manager
- A server that manages and provides access to the resources in the environment. This server can be a physical machine or a virtual machine. Moreover, the Manager can be set up as a virtual machine on a host in an environment that the Manager itself manages. This setup is known as a self-hosted engine setup.
- Storage
- Storage is used to store the data associated with virtual machines in the environment such as the virtual machines themselves and ISO files that can be used to install operating systems or other software on those virtual machines. Storage can be implemented on several storage types, including NFS, iSCSI, GlusterFS, and Fibre Channel.
- Hosts
- Hosts are servers that provide the processing capabilities and memory resources used to run virtual machines. In Red Hat Virtualization, servers running Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 or a minimal operating system specifically designed to operate as a host in Red Hat Virtualization environments, known as the Red Hat Virtualization Host, can be used as hosts.
In addition to these core components, Red Hat Virtualization allows you to set up supporting components such as a scheduler and remote servers for hosting the databases used in the environment, and to take advantage of resources in Red Hat Enterprise Linux OpenStack Platform and VMware environments.
