Shared device driver model for virtualized mobile handsets

Abstract

One of the major expected benefits of hardware virtualization in mobile handsets is the ability to use a peripheral device, for which an original device driver has been written for a particular operating system, from applications running on other operating systems. The savings and new opportunities generated by avoiding writing multiple device drivers for the same peripheral because for different operating systems (Symbian, Windows, Linux, and proprietary real-time operating systems) are tremendous, and relevant to the whole eco-system (chipset and hardware peripheral vendors, device manufacturers, Independent Software Vendors (ISVs), service providers and even end-users.This paper quantifies the scope of the problem in terms of investments, time and effort, and lost opportunities. The authors then propose an architecture based on a virtualization layer, allowing sharing and control of physical peripheral device drivers among multiple execution environments running/hosting different operating systems. The paper concludes with a discussion on research topics generated by such distributed device driver architecture within a single handset, in the areas of performance optimization, sharing policies to guarantee quality of service, access control policies, dependability (stop and restart of a device driver), power management optimization, and partial or incremental system reconfiguration.