MirageOS is a library operating system. An application written for MirageOS is compiled to an operating system kernel that only contains the specific functionality required by the application - a unikernel. The MirageOS unikernels can be compiled for different targets, including standalone VMs that run under Xen. The Xen unikernels can be deployed directly to common cloud services such as Amazon EC2 and Linode.

I have done a lot of MirageOS development for Xen lately and it can be inconvenient to have to rely on an external server or service to be able to run and debug the unikernel. As an alternative I have set up a VM in Virtualbox with a Xen server. The MirageOS unikernels then run as VMs in Xen, which itself runs in a VM in Virtualbox. With the "Host-only networking" feature in Virtualbox the unikernels are accessible from the host operating system, which can be very useful for testing client/server applications. A unikernel that hosts a web page can for example be tested in a web browser in the host OS. I am hoping that this setup may be useful to others so I am documenting it in this blog post.