The very definition of a container is that it's a set of processes, or in this case full operating system which is sharing the kernel with the host machine. This opens a full array of possibilities as far as what can be shared between host and container.
This talk will be covering some of the most common use cases, such as sharing one or multiple GPUs with a container for compute use, accessing USB devices or physical network interfaces. Then go into slightly weirder cases of kernel device passthrough and see what can be done in such containers.
Outside of the obvious GPU compute use case, device passthrough can also be used to consolidate a number of distinct, mostly idle or old machines into just a single one, including any custom hardware that they may have attached to them and with very little hassle. It's also ideal for testing environments with hardware needs.
Stéphane Graber is the upstream project leader for LXC and LXD at Canonical and a frequent speaker and track leader at events related to containers and Linux. Stéphane is a longtime contributor to the Ubuntu Linux distribution as an Ubuntu core developer and previous Ubuntu technical... Read More →