Kata Containers 1.7.0 Release Highlights

Kata Containers’ 1.7.0 release landed on May 17. This release includes optimization fixes, updated Firecracker support, along with an early experimental preview of virtio-fs.

Here are some highlights to note on the 1.7.0 release:

• Improved implementation of K8s emptyDir (ephemeral volumes) based on the host directories. This is done by creating them inside the Virtual Machine (VM) itself. If the VM is using the device mapper for container storage, the containers benefit from the better performance of the device mapper for the host emptyDir.
• Experimental virtio-fs support. Virtio-fs is a shared file system which allows VMs to access a directory tree on the host. In Kata Containers, virtio-fs can be used to share container volumes, secrets, config-maps, configuration files (hostname, hosts, resolv.conf) and the container rootfs on the host with the guest. When enabling virtio-fs, changes in the guest kernel as well as the VMM are required.
  
  Compared to 9pfs, virtio-fs provides significant performance and POSIX compliance improvements.
  
  For Kata Containers, experimental virtio-fs support is enabled through the NEMU VMM. For more information on how to get an initial look at virtio-fs support, check out the Kata Containers with virtio-fs document.
• Kata Containers now supports the latest Firecracker VMM, version 0.16.
• Initial persist API changes have been added, providing a baseline for future hot-upgrade support.

A huge thank you to each and every contributing member in our community. Without you all, this would not have been possible.

For more details on the 1.7.0 release, you can find them here.