Another year, another new trend entering the industry agenda. Docker Inc. set the wheels in motion this morning with the acquisition of Unikernel Systems Ltd, a U.K.-based startup founded by the original creators of the Xen hypervisor. Its namesake technology holds the potential to kick up the modularization of cloud services several notches.

The unikernel is an evolution of the containerization approach with which Docker made its name that borrows from traditional virtualization to try and provide the best of both worlds. Every instance is bundled with a dedicated operating system image like in Xen and other conventional alternatives, but avoids the bulk of the overhead normally produced as a result by only including the parts that are absolutely needed to perform its task. It’s a nod to the recent trend towards minimalism that CoreOS Inc. kick-started with its popular Linux distribution.

The difference is that while the Docker rival and the other vendors on the bandwagon strive to provide a common foundation for container environments, Unikernel Systems was established with the exact opposite goal in mind. Its technology allows for the operating system of every instance to be individually customized based on the requirements of the workload on top. A developer would thereby be able to remove advanced networking functionality from a deployment with limited connectivity needs, or delete certain hardware drivers. There is an endless number of potential variations.

The portions of the operating system left alone are fused with the workload into a single file that can often end up much smaller than a container running the same application. That means more are able to fit on any given machine, enabling organizations to realize a bigger return on their hardware. The lack of redundant code in unikernels also has the added benefit of reducing the number of moving parts that can be potentially exploited by hackers, a feature that could help finally pave a way for Docker into the enterprise mainstream.

One of the most oft-cited explanations for why containers have been slow to take off among traditional organizations is their subpar security compared to the conventional hypervisors that currently power most corporate workloads. Docker plans to offer Unikernel Systems’ technology as an additional deployment option in its developer tools to overcome the challenge and start seriously contesting the old guard of the virtualization world. 

Photo via Andi Graf