OS virtualization AKA “containers” have been a key to hosted web services for over a decade. The technology enables a company to efficiently utilize hardware and extract  maximum value.  With the shift in the enterprise to cloud computing and the desire to providing infrastructure as a service, containers are quickly gaining adoption.

Here are the top five reasons why OS virtualization/containers are the best virtualization solution for your SaaS enablement efforts:

1. Containers virtualize a single operating system - Containers virtualize the host operating system of the server reducing footprint, maximizing the utilization of memory and simplifying to ongoing management of the environment. By leveraging a single operating system, there is only one place to install updates and one place to make changes that are to be reflected across all virtual environments.  With virtual machines, every operating system is autonomous and requires a greater deal of management activities.

2. Container performance can be adjusted on the fly

3. Containers don't pay the typical virtualization performance penalty

4. Containers don't experience time drift

5. Containers can be cloned and running in seconds

Read the entire Parallels blog post for all the information and details on each reason above.