{"id":5,"date":"2020-01-18T12:48:33","date_gmt":"2020-01-18T17:48:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/quest\/quest\/"},"modified":"2025-12-01T13:58:35","modified_gmt":"2025-12-01T18:58:35","slug":"quest","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/quest\/","title":{"rendered":"Getting Started with the Quest RTOS and Quest-V Partitioning Hypervisor"},"content":{"rendered":"

Overview<\/h3>\n

Quest is a relatively small real-time operating system (RTOS), developed at Boston University. It works on both uni- and multicore processors, and supports various operating modes depending on the underlying hardware features. It can be configured as either a lightweight SMP system, having a single memory image running on multiple cores, or as a secure separation kernel, known as Quest-V (as in “V for Virtualization”).<\/p>\n

The Quest RTOS features a novel real-time scheduling framework, where all control flows (including those triggered by interrupts) are associated with threads mapped to priority-aware and resource accountable virtual CPUs (VCPUs). This enables Quest to provide resource reservations to tasks and interrupt handlers, which are scheduled together.<\/p>\n

When configured as a secure separation kernel, Quest-V uses hardware virtualization features to sandbox guest OSes into separate domains, each having direct access to dedicated CPU cores, physical memory, and a subset of I\/O devices. The Quest-V partitioning hypervisor is used to establish separate sandboxes for guest OS domains such as Quest, which can co-exist and work in unison with other OSes such as Linux. Secure shared memory channels link multiple guest domains together to form a tightly-coupled separation kernel.<\/p>\n

Intended Audience<\/h3>\n

This tutorial is intended for both academic researchers and industry practitioners, interested in learning more about Quest and Quest-V. We will describe how to configure, build, develop, debug, and test applications, using code examples. The audience may wish to participate via the use of tools such as QEMU\/KVM to run Quest\/Quest-V. We welcome anyone who might want to know more about contributing to the work, or using it in their own research.<\/p>\n

Tutorial Form<\/h3>\n

For those interested in attending the tutorial, please complete this form<\/a>. It is not mandatory, but it will provide us with a list of who is interested, including any items you would like to see discussed.<\/p>\n

Location and Time\"Center<\/h3>\n

CDS 950, 665 Commonwealth Avenue<\/p>\n