CentOS virt - Mar 2009 - Tips for installing Fedora 10 32bit Xen PV domU/guest on CentOS 5.3 dom0/host

Hello!

Xen and related packages (libvirt, virt-install, virt-manager etc) in Upcoming
CentOS 5.3 support
running and installing Fedora 10 (and Fedora 11) paravirtual domU guest virtual
machines.

These upstream fixes (new features) make it possible:

	"RHEL5.3 xen: include support for booting Fedora 10 DomU (i.e. bzImage
support)"
	https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=457199

	"update virtinst to install f10 xen guests"
	https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=460585

But beware there's a bug in 32bit x86 Fedora 10 installer (anaconda). It
installs wrong
kernel to the domU (it should install kernel-PAE but it installs normal kernel),
and that will prevent the domU from starting after installation. 
Xen only supports PAE kernels for 32bit PV guests.

It's this bug:
	"anaconda installs the wrong kernel for i686 xen guests"
	https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=470905

It can be "fixed" by using a kickstart file for installation, which
forces
installation of kernel-PAE instead of normal kernel.

Example of such kickstart: http://pasik.reaktio.net/fedora/f10-xen-domu-ks.cfg

Fedora 11 (current rawhide of 2009-03-24) does not have that bug anymore, so
paravirtual F11 Xen PV domU installation should work out-of-the-box. 

I've tested and verified all the above works. 
Hopefully that helps someone :) 

-- Pasi