Glossary - Revision history

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2026-10-12T04:41:01Z

Fix repository links: point to the cgit tree URLs

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	= Glossary =		= Glossary =

	<blockquote>'''What this page is.''' The terms used across this wiki, the project's documents and its logs. Condensed from [https://git.vgpu.io/open-iov/~~blob/master~~/docs/09-reference/glossary-and-faq.md <code>../docs/09-reference/glossary-and-faq.md</code>]; the docs tree wins on disagreement. For questions, see [[FAQ\|<code>FAQ.md</code>]].</blockquote>		<blockquote>'''What this page is.''' The terms used across this wiki, the project's documents and its logs. Condensed from [https://git.vgpu.io/open-iov.git/tree/docs/09-reference/glossary-and-faq.md <code>../docs/09-reference/glossary-and-faq.md</code>]; the docs tree wins on disagreement. For questions, see [[FAQ\|<code>FAQ.md</code>]].</blockquote>

	Status: 2026-10-12, tree <code>master @ 2f066727</code>.		Status: 2026-10-12, tree <code>master @ 2f066727</code>.

WikiBot: Carry the site-wide About/licensing message on every page (2026-10-12)

2026-10-12T04:29:51Z

Carry the site-wide About/licensing message on every page (2026-10-12)

← Older revision		Revision as of 04:29, 12 October 2026
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			{{About message}}

	= Glossary =		= Glossary =

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2026-10-12T04:22:15Z

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2026-10-12T04:10:04Z

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Arthur: /* Virtual GPU (vGPU) */

2023-03-27T19:24:26Z

Virtual GPU (vGPU)

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	=== Virtual GPU (vGPU) ===		=== Virtual GPU (vGPU) ===
	<blockquote>A Virtual GPU (vGPU) is a GPU which has been virtualized to represent a percentage of the total hardware resource via preemptive scheduling and/or a partition of the device's Video Random Access Memory (VRAM).</blockquote>		<blockquote>A Virtual GPU (vGPU) is a GPU which has been virtualized to represent a percentage of the total hardware resource via preemptive scheduling or thread pinning (to [https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/docs/oneapi/optimization-guide-gpu/2023-0/intel-iris-xe-gpu-architecture.html EUs], or [https://www.nvidia.com/content/PDF/nvidia-ampere-ga-102-gpu-architecture-whitepaper-v2.pdf SMs]) and/or a partition of the device's Video Random Access Memory (VRAM).</blockquote>
	=== IVSHMEM ===		=== IVSHMEM ===
	<blockquote>According to QEMU's GitHub repo: '''"The Inter-VM shared memory device (ivshmem) is designed to share a memory region between multiple QEMU processes running different guests and the host. In order for all guests to be able to pick up the shared memory area, it is modeled by QEMU as a PCI device exposing said memory to the guest as a PCI BAR."''' '''[https://github.com/qemu/qemu/blob/master/docs/specs/ivshmem-spec.txt <nowiki>[3]</nowiki>]'''</blockquote>		<blockquote>According to QEMU's GitHub repo: '''"The Inter-VM shared memory device (ivshmem) is designed to share a memory region between multiple QEMU processes running different guests and the host. In order for all guests to be able to pick up the shared memory area, it is modeled by QEMU as a PCI device exposing said memory to the guest as a PCI BAR."''' '''[https://github.com/qemu/qemu/blob/master/docs/specs/ivshmem-spec.txt <nowiki>[3]</nowiki>]'''</blockquote>

Arthur at 00:30, 2 March 2023

2023-03-02T00:30:13Z

← Older revision		Revision as of 00:30, 2 March 2023
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			<blockquote>An absence of critical technical documentation has historically slowed growth and adoption of developer ecosystems for GPU virtualization.

			This [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC-BY-4.0] licensed content can either be used with attribution, or used as inspiration for new documentation, created by GPU vendors for public commercial distribution as developer documentation.

			Where possible, this documentation will clearly label dates and versions of observed-but-not-guaranteed behaviour vs. vendor-documented stable interfaces/behaviour with guarantees of forward or backward compatibility.</blockquote>

	== Definitions ==		== Definitions ==

Arthur at 03:51, 13 September 2022

2022-09-13T03:51:26Z

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	=== VirGL ===		=== VirGL ===
	<blockquote>[[File:Virgl.png\|thumb\|A diagram depicting GPU instruction redirects to a single host graphics driver.]]lwn.net defines Virgl as: '''"a way for guests running in a virtual machine (VM) to access the host GPU using OpenGL and other APIs... The virgl stack consists of an application running in the guest that sends OpenGL to the Mesa virgl driver, which uses the virtio-gpu driver in the guest kernel to communicate with QEMU on the host."''' '''[https://lwn.net/Articles/767970/ <nowiki>[9]</nowiki>]'''</blockquote>VirGL + VirtIO-GPU have provided a robust way to run graphics instructions on hardware platforms incapable of running mediated device drivers either due to artificial vendor imposed firmware limitations on commodity GPU hardware (AMD GPU-IOV Module) or due to vendor imposed driver limitations (Nvidia GRID) where it will continue to remain relevant. Unfortunately this approach incurs a substantial performance penalty compared to VFIO passthrough.		<blockquote>[[File:Virgl.png\|thumb\|A diagram depicting GPU instruction redirects to a single host graphics driver.]]lwn.net defines Virgl as: '''"a way for guests running in a virtual machine (VM) to access the host GPU using OpenGL and other APIs... The virgl stack consists of an application running in the guest that sends OpenGL to the Mesa virgl driver, which uses the virtio-gpu driver in the guest kernel to communicate with QEMU on the host."''' '''[https://lwn.net/Articles/767970/ <nowiki>[9]</nowiki>]'''</blockquote>

Arthur: /* Definitions */

2022-08-02T18:56:17Z

Definitions

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	[[File:VFIO-Mdev Diagram.png\|thumb\|A diagram depicting VFIO Mediated Device interacting with two vGPU guests.]]		[[File:VFIO-Mdev Diagram.png\|thumb\|A diagram depicting VFIO Mediated Device interacting with two vGPU guests.]]

	=== Virtual ~~GPU~~ (vCPU) ===		=== Virtual CPU (vCPU) ===
	<blockquote>A Virtual CPU (vCPU) is a CPU which has been virtualized to represent a percentage of the total hardware resource via preemptive scheduling.</blockquote>		<blockquote>A Virtual CPU (vCPU) is a CPU which has been virtualized to represent a percentage of the total hardware resource via preemptive scheduling.</blockquote>

Arthur at 18:55, 2 August 2022

2022-08-02T18:55:44Z

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	== Definitions ==		== Definitions ==
	This ~~section~~ will attempt to ~~define some~~ of ~~the~~ terms that are either related to ~~the content of this article~~ or ~~were~~ used ~~throughout this article~~ for those who may need more context.		This article will attempt to provide a glossary of common terms that are either related to/or often used in connection with virtualization for those who may need more context.

			If you have suggestions on how to improve the glossary you can [https://openmdev.io/index.php/Main_Page#Getting_Started_Contributing_to_OpenMdev.io '''contribute'''] or join our [https://discord.gg/Rb9K9DYxKK '''community discussion thread'''] to make suggestions.

	=== VFIO ===		=== VFIO ===

Arthur: /* Virtual GPU (vGPU) */

2022-08-02T18:53:01Z

Virtual GPU (vGPU)

← Older revision		Revision as of 18:53, 2 August 2022
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	=== Virtual GPU (vGPU) ===		=== Virtual GPU (vGPU) ===
	<blockquote>A Virtual GPU (vGPU) is a GPU which has been virtualized to represent a percentage of the total hardware resource via preemptive scheduling and/or a partition of the device's ~~video memory~~ (VRAM).</blockquote>		<blockquote>A Virtual GPU (vGPU) is a GPU which has been virtualized to represent a percentage of the total hardware resource via preemptive scheduling and/or a partition of the device's Video Random Access Memory (VRAM).</blockquote>
	=== IVSHMEM ===		=== IVSHMEM ===
	<blockquote>According to QEMU's GitHub repo: '''"The Inter-VM shared memory device (ivshmem) is designed to share a memory region between multiple QEMU processes running different guests and the host. In order for all guests to be able to pick up the shared memory area, it is modeled by QEMU as a PCI device exposing said memory to the guest as a PCI BAR."''' '''[https://github.com/qemu/qemu/blob/master/docs/specs/ivshmem-spec.txt <nowiki>[3]</nowiki>]'''</blockquote>		<blockquote>According to QEMU's GitHub repo: '''"The Inter-VM shared memory device (ivshmem) is designed to share a memory region between multiple QEMU processes running different guests and the host. In order for all guests to be able to pick up the shared memory area, it is modeled by QEMU as a PCI device exposing said memory to the guest as a PCI BAR."''' '''[https://github.com/qemu/qemu/blob/master/docs/specs/ivshmem-spec.txt <nowiki>[3]</nowiki>]'''</blockquote>