febootstrap purpose status
by Paul Lambert
Can I get an explanation of the targeted users of this distro? The
reason I ask is twofold. 1) I am looking for a bare metal OS to base
real time control on and 2) I believe that VMware has it right with
respects to hypervisor architecture. Again, a bare metal host with the
actual guest OS running the interface and application code.
My current configuration using Fedora 11 as the host and running WinXP
as a guest is what I term the "workstation" mode. The host OS still
performs user interface and file storage functions for users. This is
the same as using VMware workstation. The full hyperviser mode would be
a minimum Fedora build that allows a command line only interface. No
graphics libraries or other user intereface systems. This is
essentially ESX. I would create a Fedora 11 appliance and a WinXP
appliance and import these through command line instructions. (Or
better yet, Fedora would release a distro that included installing the
bare metal version and the full Fedora appliance.) The Fedora guest
then could connect back to the bare metal host to perform monitoring and
VM management function (oVirt).
I want this on my laptop. Upgrading the host while it is also serving
as a workstation is too risky and a lot of work to perform OS testing
and evaluation. It's too easy to copy out one's guest VMs and reload or
upgrade the host. Then when this activity is complete just reinstall
the original host and VM appliances. Backup and restore are much easier
as well.
The last I saw on the febootstrap size I believe it was just under 20
mb. This still seams extremely large for a bare metal system. I need
the Fedora filesystem with KVM and the hardware driver library. How
small can we go? I would like to try this.
Thanks for any feedback and direction
Paul
14 years, 9 months
libvirt configuration for cluster of qemu/kvm hosts
by Gianluca Cecchi
Hello,
is there any pointer about how to set up a cluster of Qemu/KVM hosts?
I'm on F11 x86_64 for the hosts.
I read requirements for KVM migration in general highlighted at
http://www.linux-kvm.org/page/Migration but I keep having doubts, in
particular regarding libvirt configuration in cluster environments...
Some questions about libvirt configuration:
- /etc/libvirt/qemu/networks
do the files inside here be identical between hosts (default.xml and
other custom configured network ones)?
What are the uuid tags into the xml for? Do they have to be identical
for clusters or do they have to be absolutely different for a sort of
"identification" of host (as the term seems to suggest)?
If I have guests that use virbr0 and use dhcp for their network
config, and want two different qemu/kvm hosts able to migrate these
guests between them, need to have same config or what?
- the same for storage configuration and other parameters.
Suppose I clone a pre-config F11 host configured with libvirt, and
suppose I have to differentiate uuid for networks/storage (see
questions above), do I have a method to regenerate these uuid values
inside xml files?
Thanks in advance for any pointer.
Gianluca
14 years, 9 months
networking in virtual machines using libvirt tools
by Rich Mahn
I am trying to set up a virtual machine that has a routable IP address
on the same subnet (and physically the same ethernet card) as the host
machine, running f11 on the host.
Using virsh and related, I can easily set up the network on the VM as
a natted IP with dhcp. This is taken care of in the defaults for
virt-manager. I can also set up, (but not quite as easily) the
network the way I want on a CentOS/XEN host. Unfortunately CentOS
doesn't have a number of other features that I want/need.
So...is there some XML snippet I can add to the domain that will
do what I want automatically? Or is there a script (or maybe I need
to write one) that can be invoked to set up the interfaces?
I would certainly be appreciative to get some pointers on how to proceed.
To make what I want a little clearer:
My host has a routable IP address such as 123.45.67.89. I want my
VM to have the routable IP address 123.45.67.90.
I realize I could probably do this with iptables on the host and using
the 192.168.x.x IP on the VM, but then the VM has an incorrect idea of
it's correct IP.
Any help is appreciated. Thanks.
14 years, 9 months
ANNOUNCE: libguestfs 1.0.64 released
by Richard W.M. Jones
I'm pleased to announce the release of libguestfs 1.0.64, the library
for accessing and modifying virtual machine disk images.
Homepage: http://libguestfs.org/
Downloads: http://libguestfs.org/download/
Git repo: http://git.et.redhat.com/?p=libguestfs.git
Fedora builds: http://koji.fedoraproject.org/koji/packageinfo?packageID=8391
NOTE at present there is a bug in qemu's vmchannel which stops
libguestfs from working correctly with the very latest qemu from git.
Use a stable 0.10.X version, or apply this patch:
http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/qemu-devel/2009-07/msg01753.html
(These release notes include changes since the previous announcement,
which was for 1.0.59)
* New tool: virt-cat. This tool lets you copy out files from a
guest. See this page for some interesting and unexpected uses:
http://libguestfs.org/virt-cat.1.html#examples
* Added libguestfs-test-tool which is a tool you can use to
diagnose qemu / kernel booting problems, and also make bug
reports more useful.
* [Sys::Guestfs::Lib] split $os->{version} into $os->{major_version}
and $os->{minor_version}. Add feature tags. (Matt Booth).
* Allow TMPDIR to be used to override the location of temporary files.
* Implement the guestfs_read_file call.
* New calls guestfs_mkmountpoint and guestfs_rmmountpoint to allow
some specialized read-only or nested filesystems to be mounted,
particularly for examining live CDs.
http://rwmj.wordpress.com/2009/07/15/unpack-the-russian-doll-of-a-f11-liv...
* New call guestfs_mountpoints to return a hash of device -> mountpoint.
* Many documentation fixes, including an "API Overview" section
which will help developers navigate parts of the now very large
libguestfs API.
http://libguestfs.org/guestfs.3.html#api_overview
* Add ~ and ~username expansion in guestfish (RHBZ#511372).
* Add kernel modules for reading DOS filesystems (Guido Gunther).
* Add i18n support for Perl strings.
Bugs fixed:
* Fix guestfish -i / virt-inspector when working with libvirt domain
names, so now 'guestfish -i libvirtdom' really works.
* Detect renamed guestfwd support for vmchannel in upstream qemu.
* Always pass noapic on kernel command line (workaround for RHBZ#502058)
* Workaround for udev timeouts.
* Check /usr/libexec for qemu binary, for RHEL 5.4.
* Multiple fixes for non-srcdir builds.
Rich.
--
Richard Jones, Emerging Technologies, Red Hat http://et.redhat.com/~rjones
virt-top is 'top' for virtual machines. Tiny program with many
powerful monitoring features, net stats, disk stats, logging, etc.
http://et.redhat.com/~rjones/virt-top
14 years, 9 months
Xenner, Ok, who has used it and can somebody provide a syntax example / real example?
by Lester M.
Xenner, yes xenner...
Ok, who has used it and can somebody provide a syntax example / real
example?
Did the google / yahoo / <insert default search engine here> search, I would
like to see an example, as well as hear of everyone's experiences using
xenner, while we wait for a more stable native dom0 / upstream support for
xen.
Any takers? :-)
14 years, 9 months
qemu question/clarification
by Gene Czarcinski
qemu documentation such as the man page for qemu-img says that only versions 3
and 4 for the vmdk files are supported. What does this mean?
If I run "strings" on a vmdk (sparse file, single image), I get some text lines
which appear to describe the virtual disk. One of these lines is:
HWversion=n
If I create a VMware guest under Workstation 6.5.2 and specify Workstation 4
compatibility, I get HWversion=3. If I specify Workstation 6.5.2
compatibility, then I get HWversion=7. I assume that HWversion=4 will be true
for Workstation 5 compatibility but I have not tested that.
Is this what is meant by "versions 3 and 4" compatibility by qemu?
I have run qemu-img to convert various vmdk files and it does not complain
about non HWversion=3 or HWversion=4 files. Furthermore, the converted files
seem OK when examined by guestfish.
Gene
14 years, 9 months
do current virt packages work well with 2.6.31-rc3?
by Robert P. J. Day
for various reasons, i'm running my fully-updated f11 system with a
2.6.31-rc3 kernel, which i got by copying the current config file from
/boot and running "make oldconfig". is there any reason that this
won't work with the current fedora 11 virt packages?
the only issue i'm having is with the radeon video driver that won't
let me run in full 1280x800 but, other than that, all else looks good.
is there any reason to think that virtualization will fail with this
newer kernel? thanks.
rday
--
========================================================================
Robert P. J. Day Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry.
Web page: http://crashcourse.ca
Twitter: http://twitter.com/rpjday
"Kernel Newbie Corner" column @ linux.com: http://cli.gs/WG6WYX
========================================================================
14 years, 9 months
Win slave disk not booting
by Paul Lambert
I create a second bootable disk on my Win guest. I then copy my existing
boot disk to the new disk with a Win track for track copy program. I when
remove the existing boot disk and attempt to boot the Win vm with the new
bootable disk the boot program returns an error that it can't find boot
information.
Essentially I am using the same technique with software disks that I do when
replacing physical hard drives. Install the new disk in an external USB
enclosure and perform the track for track copy then install the new disk as
the boot disk. Works everytime. Why won't this work in a virtual guest? I
am doing this to reduce the size of my disk space. There's most likely a
virt command line utility but the GUI program should work too.
The only thing different I notice is that the second disk is being
configured as a bootable slave.
Updated several bugs with new findings.
PJAL
14 years, 9 months
