History of Virtual Machines & Containers

An interactive timeline visualization tracing the evolution of virtualization technology from IBM mainframes in 1967 to modern containers, serverless computing, and cutting-edge research in 2025.

Run the VM Timeline

View Timeline Data (JSON)

Overview

This timeline covers nearly 60 years of virtualization history, organized into seven categories:

Mainframe Era - IBM's pioneering work on CP-40, CP-67, and VM/370
Hardware Support - Intel VT-x and AMD-V virtualization extensions
Hypervisors - VMware, Xen, and KVM development
Containers - From FreeBSD Jails to Docker
Serverless & Cloud - AWS Lambda, Cloud Functions, and Firecracker
Infrastructure Tools - Terraform, Packer, Nomad, and Crossplane
Research - Academic studies on performance and emerging architectures

Features

Interactive Elements

Category Filtering - Click filter buttons to view specific event types
Pan and Zoom - Use navigation buttons or click-and-drag to explore
Event Details - Click any event to see full description and historical context
Hover Tooltips - Hover over events for quick context notes

Visual Design

Color-coded categories - Each category has a distinct color for easy identification
Responsive layout - Works on desktop, tablet, and mobile devices
Legend panel - Visual guide showing all category colors

Key Milestones

Year	Event	Significance
1967	IBM CP-40/CP-67	Birth of virtualization
1972	IBM VM/370	First commercial VM OS
1998	VMware founded	x86 virtualization begins
2003	Xen released	Open-source hypervisor
2007	KVM in Linux	Linux becomes a hypervisor
2013	Docker launch	Container revolution
2014	AWS Lambda	Serverless computing debuts
2020	Firecracker	MicroVMs for serverless

Embedding in Other Pages

To embed this timeline in another MkDocs page:

<iframe src="../sims/vm-timeline/main.html"
        width="100%"
        height="700px"
        style="border: none;">
</iframe>

Data Format

The timeline data is stored in timeline.json using a TimelineJS-compatible format:

{
  "title": "Timeline Title",
  "events": [
    {
      "start_date": {
        "year": "2024",
        "month": "1",
        "display_date": "January 2024"
      },
      "text": {
        "headline": "Event Title",
        "text": "Event description."
      },
      "group": "Category Name",
      "notes": "Additional context for tooltips."
    }
  ]
}

Adding New Events

Open timeline.json
Add a new event object to the events array
Include required fields: start_date, text.headline, text.text
Optionally add group (category) and notes (tooltip text)
Reload the page to see your changes

Technical Details

Timeline Library: vis-timeline 7.7.3
Data Format: TimelineJS-compatible JSON
Browser Support: Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Edge
Dependencies: vis-timeline.js (CDN)