What is a Virtual Machine — VM
You’ve probably heard the term VM, maybe in a tech podcast or read it in a blog post, but what is it really? I’m going to tell you what it is.
VM stands for Virtual Machine. To an end-user like you and me, a VM isn’t any different than a physical machine like your laptop. It is a CPU, memory, and disks to store your files, and can connect to the internet if needed.
A physical machine is, well, physical. You can touch it, see it. It’s a tangible thing. A virtual machine exists only as code, a software-defined computer that is running. The two basic types of virtual machines are process and system VMs.
System Virtual Machine - SVM
A system virtual machine is a fully virtualized VM designed to be a substitute for a physical machine. It runs on top of a specialized operating system called a hypervisor such as VMware ESXi. A hypervisor is software that sits between the physical hardware and the VM. Like a traffic cop would control the flow of traffic coming and going through the intersection, the hypervisor is making sure each VM gets the resources it needs in an orderly manner.
Process (Application) Virtual Machine — PVM or AVM
A process virtual machine allows you to run a single process as an application on a host machine. An example of a process virtual machine is the Java Virtual Machine (JVM) which allows any system to run Java applications as if they were native to the system.
In the case of Cloud Platforms, VMs are running in the cloud. What is the cloud? The cloud is a network of powerful servers running hypervisors and data centers all over the world. The term cloud is used to visualize that a VM can be just about anywhere on the planet. We use the internet to access the information and services that are running in the cloud from your app, browser, or device. So there you have it.
We’ve revealed the mystery behind what a VM is. I’m sure you’re curious about how you can try one out. If you’re a developer needing space to build and deploy your apps to the cloud or if you’re looking to try a different operating system, try Google Cloud Platform. There are great documentation and tutorials that will help get you up and running fast. Click this link for more information on how to get started.
