Abstract: Virtualization are one of the most trending technologies in the world of Information Technology and are gaining popularity around the world due to their cost reducing nature, flexibility and scalability. In this paper we intend to provide a software framework for cloud computing for college laboratories: system that provides a model in which operating systems are hosted by a central server. Clones of virtual machines hosting the operating systems are made available to the clients on demand. The availability of operating systems is made over a network, typically internet or intranet using the SSH protocol for communication between the client and the server. The central server will be providing a resource rich environment empowering the user to optimize resources, increase scalability by creating clients dynamically and flexibility to customize application accessibility. The Software framework, principled on server virtualization techniques that can be achieved using kernel virtual machine (KVM). The proposed framework is simple, modular and provides access to infrastructure commonly found within an academia. The software framework will also be equipped with a friendly graphical user interface and eliminates the tedious process of using command prompt for creating and managing virtual machines. The GUI enables the user to generate desired number of clients within the predefined server’s client generation limits. It also permits the user to deploy variable packages to the created clients on request.
Keywords: Virtualization, Kernel Virtual Machine (KVM), Virtual Machine, Libvirt API.