runq is a hypervisor-based Docker runtime based on runc to run regular Docker images in a lightweight KVM/Qemu virtual machine. The focus is on solving real problems, not on number of features.
Key differences to other hypervisor-based runtimes:
- minimalistic design, small code base
- no modification to existing Docker tools (dockerd, containerd, runc...)
- coexistence of runq containers and regular runc containers
- no extra state outside of Docker (no libvirt, no changes to /var/run/...)
- simple init daemon, no systemd, no busybox
- no custom guest kernel or custom qemu needed
- runs on x86_64 and s390x
runc container runq container
+-------------------------+ +-------------------------+
| | | +---------------------+ |
| | | | VM | |
| | | | | |
| | | | | |
| application | | | application | |
| | | | | |
| | | | | |
| | | +---------------------+ |
| | | | guest kernel | |
| | | +---------------------+ |
| | | qemu |
+-------------------------+ +-------------------------+
----------------------------------------------------------------------
host kernel
runq requires a host kernel >= 4.8 with KVM and VHOST_VSOCK support enabled. The easiest way to build runq and to put all dependencies together is using Docker. For fast development cycles a regular build environment might be more efficient. For this refer to section Developing runq below.
# get the source
git clone https://github.com/gotoz/runq.git
cd runq
# compile and create a release tar file in Docker container
make release
# install runq to `/var/lib/runq`
make release-install
Register runq as Docker runtime with appropriate defaults. See daemon.json for more options.
/etc/docker/daemon.json
{
"runtimes": {
"runq": {
"path": "/var/lib/runq/runq",
"runtimeArgs": [
"--cpu", "1",
"--mem", "256",
"--dns", "8.8.8.8,8.8.4.4"
]
}
}
}
reload Docker config
systemctl reload docker.service
runq-exec creates a secure connection between host and VM guests. Users of runq-exec are authenticated via a client certificate. Access to the client certificate must be limitted to Docker users only.
The CA and server certificates must be installed in /var/lib/runq/qemu/certs
.
Access must be limmited to the root user only.
Examples of server and client TLS certificates can be created with the script:
/var/lib/runq/qemu/mkcerts.sh
Note: The host must provide sufficient entropy to the VM guests. If there is not enough entropie available booting of guests can fail with a timeout error. The entropy that's currently available can be checked with:
cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail
The number returned should always be greater than 1000.
The kernel module vhost_vsock
must be loaded on the host. This can be achieved by creating
a config file for the systemd-modules-load service: /etc/modules-load.d/vhost-vsock.conf
:
# Load vhost_vsock for runq
vhost_vsock
the simplest example
docker run --runtime runq -ti busybox sh
custom VM with 512MiB memory and 2 CPUs
docker run --runtime runq -e RUNQ_MEM=512 -e RUNQ_CPU=2 -ti busybox sh
allow loading of extra kernel modules by adding the SYS_MODULE capabilitiy
docker run --runtime runq --cap-add sys_module -ti busybox sh -c "modprobe brd && lsmod"
full example PostgreSQL with custom storage
dd if=/dev/zero of=data.img bs=1M count=200
mkfs.ext4 -F data.img
docker run \
--runtime runq \
--name pgserver \
-e RUNQ_CPU=2 \
-e RUNQ_MEM=512 \
-e POSTGRES_PASSWORD=mysecret \
-v $PWD/data.img:/dev/runq/0001/writeback/ext4/var/lib/postgresql \
-d postgres:alpine
sleep 10
docker run \
--runtime runq \
--link pgserver:postgres \
--rm \
-e PGPASSWORD=mysecret \
postgres:alpine psql -h postgres -U postgres -c "select 42 as answer;"
# answer
# --------
# 42
# (1 row)
docker cli
dockerd engine
docker-containerd-shim
runq container
+--------------------------------------------------------+
| |
docker0 | VM |
veth <------> veth +--------------------------+ |
| `<--- macvtap ---|-------> eth0 | |
| | | |
| proxy | init | |
| | | |
| msg, signals <-----|-------> vport | |
| | | |
| /overlayfs <-----|-------> /app | |
| | | |
| block dev <-----|-------> /dev/xvda | |
| | | |
runq-exec ----(TLS)-----------------------> vsockd | |
| | | |
| +--------------------------+ |
| | guest kernel | |
| +--------------------------+ |
| qemu |
| |
+--------------------------------------------------------+
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
host kernel
-
cmd/runq
- new docker runtime
-
cmd/proxy
- Docker entry point
- first process in container (PID 1)
- configures and starts Qemu (network, disks, ...)
- forwards signals to VM init
- receives application exit code
-
cmd/init
- first process in VM (PID 1)
- initializes the VM guest (network, disks, ...)
- starts/stops target app (Docker entry point)
- sends signals to target application
- forwards application exit code back to proxy
-
cmd/runq-exec
- command line utility similar to docker exec
-
qemu
- creates
/var/lib/runq/qemu
- read-only volume attached to every container
- contains proxy, qemu, kernel and initrd
- creates
-
initrd
- temporary root file system of the VM
- contains only init and a few kernel modules
-
pkg/vm
- type definitions and configuration
-
pkg/util
- utiliy functions used accross all commands
runq-exec (/var/lib/runq/runq-exec
) is a command line utility similar to docker exec. It allows running
additional commands in existing runq containers executed from the host. It uses
VirtioVsock for the communication
between host and VMs. TLS is used for encryption and client authorization. Support for
runq-exec
can be disabled by setting the container environment variable RUNQ_NOEXEC
.
Usage:
runq-exec [options] <container> command args
Run a command in a running runq container
Options:
-c, --tlscert string TLS certificate file (default "/var/lib/runq/cert.pem")
-k, --tlskey string TLS private key file (default "/var/lib/runq/key.pem")
-e, --env stringArray Set environment variables for command
-h, --help Print this help
-i, --interactive Keep STDIN open even if not attached
-t, --tty Allocate a pseudo-TTY
-v, --version Print version
Environment Variable:
DOCKER_HOST specifies the Docker daemon socket.
Example:
runq-exec -ti a6c3b7c bash
runq runs Qemu and Linux Kernel from the /var/lib/runq/qemu
directory
on the host. This directory is populated by make -C qemu
. For simplicity
Qemu and the Linux kernel are taken from the Ubuntu 18.04 LTS Docker base image.
See qemu/x86_64/Dockerfile for details.
This makes runq independent of the Linux distribution on the host.
Qemu does not need to be installed on the host.
The kernel modules directory (/var/lib/runq/qemu/lib/modules
)
is bind-mounted
into every container to /lib/modules
.
This allows the loading of extra kernel modules in any container if needed.
For this SYS_MODULES capability is required (--cap-add sys_modules
).
runq uses Macvtap devices to connect Qemu VirtIO interfaces to Docker bridges. By default a single ethernet interface is created. Multiple networks can be used by connecting a container to the networks before start. See test/integration/net.sh as an example.
runq container can also be connected to one or more Docker networks of type Macvlan. This allows a direct connection between the VM and the physical host network without bridge and without NAT. See https://docs.docker.com/network/macvlan/ for details.
Docker uses an embedded DNS server (127.0.0.11) for containers that are connected to custom networks. This IP is not reachable from within the VM. Therefore DNS for runq containers must be configured seperatetly.
DNS configuration can be done globally via runtime options specified in
'daemon.json' (see example above) or via environment variables for each
container at container start.
The environment variables are RUNQ_DNS
, RUNQ_DNS_OPT
and RUNQ_DNS_SEARCH
.
Environment variables have priority over global options.
Extra storage can be added in the form of Qcow2 images, raw file images or regular block devices. Storage devices will be mounted automatically if a filesytem and a mount point has been specified. Supported filesystems are ext2, ext3, ext4, xfs and btrfs. Cache type must be writeback, writethrough, none or unsafe. See man qemu(1) for details about different cache types.
Syntax:
--volume <image name>:/dev/runq/<id>/<cache type>[/<filesystem type>/<mount point>]
--device <device name>:/dev/runq/<id>/<cache type>[/<filesystem type>/<mount point>]
<id>
is used to create symbolic links inside the VM guest that point to the Qemu Virtio device
files. The id
can be any character string that matches the regex pattern "^[a-zA-Z0-9-_]{1,36}$"
but it must be unique within a container.
/dev/disk/by-runq-id/0001 -> ../../vda
Mount the existing Qcow image /data.qcow2
with xfs filesystem to /mnt/data
:
docker run -v /data.qcow2:/dev/runq/0001/writeback/xfs/mnt/data ...
Attach the host device /dev/sdb1
formatted with ext4 to /mnt/data2
:
docker run --device /dev/sdb1:/dev/runq/0002/writethrough/ext4/mnt/data2 ...
Attach the host device /dev/sdb2
without mounting:
docker run --device /dev/sdb2:/dev/runq/0003/writethrough ...
By default runq drops all capabilities except those needed (same as regular Docker does). The white list of the remaining capabilities is provided by the Docker engine.
AUDIT_WRITE CHOWN DAC_OVERRIDE FOWNER FSETID KILL MKNOD NET_BIND_SERVICE NET_RAW SETFCAP SETGID SETPCAP SETUID SYS_CHROOT
See man capabilities
for a list of all available capabilities.
Additional Capabilities can be added to the whitelist at container start:
docker run --cap-add SYS_TIME --cap-add SYS_MODULE ...`
runq supports the default Docker seccomp profile as well as custom profiles.
docker run --security-opt seccomp=<profile-file> ...
The default profile is defined by the Docker daemon and gets applied automatically. Note: Only the runq init binary is statically linked against libseccomp. Therefore libseccomp is needed only at compile time.
If the host operating system where runq is beeing built does not provide static libseccomp libraries one can also simply build and install libseccomp from the sources.
Seccomp can be disabled at container start:
docker run --security-opt seccomp=unconfined ...
Note: Some Docker daemon don't support custom Seccomp profiles. Run docker info
to verify
that Seccomp is supported by your daemon. If it is supported the output of docker info
looks like this:
Security Options:
seccomp
Profile: default
Most docker commands and options work as expected. However, due to the fact that the target application runs inside a Qemu VM which itself runs inside a Docker container and because of the minimalistic design principle of runq some docker commands and options don't work. E.g:
- adding / removing networks and storage dynamically
- docker exec (see runq-exec)
- docker swarm
- privileged mode
- apparmor, selinux, ambient
The following common options of docker run
are supported:
--attach --name
--cap-add --network
--cap-drop --publish
--cpus --restart
--cpuset-cpus --rm
--detach --runtime
--entrypoint --sysctl
--env --security-opt seccomp=unconfined
--env-file --security-opt no-new-privileges
--expose --security-opt seccomp=<filter-file>
--group-add --tmpfs
--help --tty
--hostname --ulimit
--interactive --user
--ip --volume
--link --volumes-from
--mount --workdir
A nested VM is a virtual machine that runs inside of a virtual machine. In plain KVM this feature is
considered working but not meant for production use. Running KVM guests inside guests of other
hypervisors such as VMware might not work as expected or might not work at all.
However to try out runq in a VM guest the (experimental) runq runtime configuration parameter
--nestedvm
can be used. It modifies the parameters of the Qemu process.
AP devices provide cryptographic functions to all CPUs assigned to a linux system running in
an IBM Z system LPAR. AP devices can be made available to a runq container by passing a VFIO mediated
device from the host through Qemu into the runq VM guest. VFIO mediaded devices are enabled by the
vfio_ap
kernel module and allow for partitioning of AP devices and domains. The environment variable RUNQ_APUUID spcecifies the VFIO mediated device UUID. runq automatically loads the required zcrypt kernel modules inside the VM. E.g.:
docker run --runtime runq -e RUNQ_APUUID=b34543ee-496b-4769-8312-83707033e1de ...
For details on how to setup mediated devices on the host see https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git/tree/Documentation/s390/vfio-ap.txt
For fast development cycles runq can be build on the host as follows:
- Prerequisites:
- Docker >= 17.09.x-ce
- Go >= 1.11
/var/lib/runq
must be writable by the current user- Libseccomp static library.
E.g.
libseccomp-dev
for Ubuntu orlibseccomp-static
for Fedora
- Download runc and runq source code
go get -d -u github.com/opencontainers/runc go get -d -u github.com/gotoz/runq
- Install Qemu and guest kernel to
/var/lib/runq/qemu
All files are taken from the Ubuntu 18.04 LTS Docker base image.cd $GOPATH/src/github.com/gotoz/runq make -C qemu all install
- Compile and install runq components to
/var/lib/runq
make install
- Create TLS certificates
/var/lib/runq/qemu/mkcerts.sh
- Adjust file and directory permissions
sudo chown -R root:root /var/lib/runq
- Register runq as Docker runtime with appropriate defaults as shown in section Installation above.
See CONTRIBUTING for details.
The code is licensed under the Apache License 2.0.
See LICENSE for further details.