Has anyone attempted to run a generic (read non Linux/Windows)
paravirtualized guest OS instance on XCP -0.1.1? A good example would
just be building mini-OS and running it as a guest instance on XCP. My
company has PV OS prototype version of one of its products that has been
running on non-XCP versions of Xen and I would like to evaluate whether
XCP is a suitable platform. In order to do this I need to get past some
pretty basic questions and issues. For example, if you were to run
mini-OS in a VM, what template would you start with? I started out with
"Other install media" but it is unclear if that is appropriate. I was
able to create the guest instance shown below, but that leads to the
other questions, i.e.
1) How do the old config file startup parameters for my OS instance
map to the new ''xe'' syntax, e.g.
memory = 2048
vcpu=1
on_crash = ''coredump-destroy''
2) How do I connect to the serial console on the OS instance? For
instance, when I do:
[root@xenserver-wvgdltag ios]# xe console-list
uuid ( RO) : 0d5dfe39-c2e7-c042-6a2c-b02ca0837cd8
vm-uuid ( RO): e4a25680-8b48-50d2-18bf-a527b4a959c7
vm-name-label ( RO): PVGonXen
protocol ( RO): RFB
location ( RO):
https://171.69.216.75/console?ref=OpaqueRef:8013f91e-ffc0-2d72-8883-d0d1
4d38130a
.
.
The https connection is not found when I try to open it. Basically, I
want to do the equivalent of ''xm console uid'' or ''xm
create -c uid''.
Thanks for your help,
Phil
[root@xenserver-wvgdltag ios]# xe vm-install template="Other install
media" new-name-label=PVGonXen
e4a25680-8b48-50d2-18bf-a527b4a959c7
[root@xenserver-wvgdltag ios]# xe vm-param-set
uuid=e4a25680-8b48-50d2-18bf-a527b4a959c7 \
> PV-kernel=''/boot/pvg/i86bi-ipbase-ms'' \
> PV-args= \
> PV-bootloader= \
> PV-bootloader-args=
[root@xenserver-wvgdltag ios]# xe vm-start
uuid=e4a25680-8b48-50d2-18bf-a527b4a959c7
[root@xenserver-wvgdltag ios]# xe vm-list
uuid ( RO) : 26e0a368-af72-42ec-afb1-4291dc7d6b39
name-label ( RW): Control domain on host: xenserver-wvgdltag
power-state ( RO): running
uuid ( RO) : e4a25680-8b48-50d2-18bf-a527b4a959c7
name-label ( RW): PVGonXen
power-state ( RO): running
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On Wed, 2010-03-24 at 18:14 +0000, Phil Winterfield (winterfi) wrote:> Has anyone attempted to run a generic (read non Linux/Windows) > paravirtualized guest OS instance on XCP -0.1.1? A good example would > just be building mini-OS and running it as a guest instance on XCP. > My company has PV OS prototype version of one of its products that has > been running on non-XCP versions of Xen and I would like to evaluate > whether XCP is a suitable platform. In order to do this I need to get > past some pretty basic questions and issues. For example, if you were > to run mini-OS in a VM, what template would you start with? I started > out with "Other install media" but it is unclear if that is > appropriate. I was able to create the guest instance shown below, but > that leads to the other questions, i.e.I don''t think you want to start from a template here, since none of the existing ones meet your needs/usecase. You can create a basic VM instance with "xe vm-create" and then configure that however you need by modifying the various fields on the VM object. You may choose to convert it to a template for convenience of instantiating multiple copies (using "xe vm-install").> 1) How do the old config file startup parameters for my OS > instance map to the new ‘xe’ syntax, e.g.Given a VM UUID (call it $VM) returned by xe vm-create you can do "xe vm-param-set uuid=$VM param1=val1 param2=val2" just like you have been doing. I think the fields are all documented in the reference manual -- unfortunately I can''t find the XCP version anywhere online. Does anyone know where this is? Until that document is found I think the core stuff you are interested in the same as on XenServer stuff so that reference doc should be enough to get you going: http://docs.vmd.citrix.com/XenServer/5.5.0/1.0/en_gb/api/docs/html/browser.html Once you have created the VM you probably want to set PV-bootloader, PV-kernel, PV-ramdisk, PV-args as you are now. If you aren''t going to create a template then you can just use "xe vm-disk-add" to add disks to your VM as required. If you are going to convert to a template and install from there then it would be better to set other-config:disks to a suitable snippet of XML to create the appropriate disks at vm-install time -- see the existing templates for an example of the syntax.> memory = 2048I think you have to use xe vm-memory-{static,dynamic}-range-set instead of vm-param-set for these ones. Each one takes a min and a max. In the first instance I''d just set them all the same, i.e. "2048MiB" but in the future if you are interested in enabling ballooning you can set ranges etc.> vcpu=1Set VCPUs-max and VCPUs-at-startup. Again I would set them to the same value to start with until you want to be able to dynamically add more VCPUs than you started with to your VM without rebooting.> on_crash = ''coredump-destroy''You can set "action-after-crash" to one of "Preserve", "Destroy", "Restart". I don''t know if there is a direct equivalent to coredump-destroy in XCP.> 2) How do I connect to the serial console on the OS instance? For > instance, when I do:The consoles are exported via XenAPI in VNC format. You need a XenAPI client which is capable of attaching to these. Looks like http://www.xvpsource.org/ is the place to look? Personally I usually use /opt/xensource/debug/vncproxy (copied to my workstation) to create a local socket on my workstation which is proxied to the XCP host and then run vncviewer locally against that proxy. Ian. _______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel
On Wed, 2010-03-24 at 19:45 +0000, Ian Campbell wrote:> > Given a VM UUID (call it $VM) returned by xe vm-create you can do "xe > vm-param-set uuid=$VM param1=val1 param2=val2" just like you have been > doing. I think the fields are all documented in the reference manual > -- unfortunately I can''t find the XCP version anywhere online. Does > anyone know where this is?I''ve been pointed to: http://www.xen.org/files/XenCloud/ocamldoc/apidoc.html Ian. _______________________________________________ xen-api mailing list xen-api@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/mailman/listinfo/xen-api
Anil Madhavapeddy
2010-Mar-24 20:50 UTC
Re: [Xen-API] Re: [Xen-devel] Generic PV Guests on XCP?
On 24 Mar 2010, at 19:45, Ian Campbell wrote:> > I don''t think you want to start from a template here, since none of the > existing ones meet your needs/usecase. You can create a basic VM > instance with "xe vm-create" and then configure that however you need by > modifying the various fields on the VM object. You may choose to convert > it to a template for convenience of instantiating multiple copies (using > "xe vm-install").I find it a lot easier to clone the "Other Install Media" template and just set the 3 fields to convert it into a PV template (clear HVM-boot-policy, set PV-kernel to the MiniOS file in dom0, PV-args if you need). I think my old blog entry on Ubuntu HVM->PV has more of the gory details, but most isnt necessary for MiniOS: http://community.citrix.com/x/4YINAg> > The consoles are exported via XenAPI in VNC format. You need a XenAPI > client which is capable of attaching to these. Looks like > http://www.xvpsource.org/ is the place to look? > > Personally I usually use /opt/xensource/debug/vncproxy (copied to my > workstation) to create a local socket on my workstation which is proxied > to the XCP host and then run vncviewer locally against that proxy.To access the raw serial console by text (the equivalent of ''xm create -c''), you first need to disable the VNC proxy from spawning (set the VM other-config:disable_pv_vnc field to something), start the VM paused, and then connect to it directly using xenconsole from dom0, and then unpause the VM I use this small script in dom0 to automate this for a given VM uuid: http://github.com/avsm/mirage/blob/master/scripts/run_minios Although to be honest, for MiniOS work, I just find it far more convenient to just use the lower-level Python toolstack, and then switch to XCP for the higher level management stuff. -anil _______________________________________________ xen-api mailing list xen-api@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/mailman/listinfo/xen-api
Phil Winterfield (winterfi)
2010-Mar-25 19:48 UTC
RE: [Xen-API] Re: [Xen-devel] Generic PV Guests on XCP?
Anil, I am interested in your suggestion to use domain0 and the lower-level Python tool stack for initial development on an XCP platform. Could you tell me more about your technique for doing that, i.e. how do I go about getting access to domain0 and the ''xm'' python api set on XCP? Thanks, Phil> > > > The consoles are exported via XenAPI in VNC format. You need aXenAPI> > client which is capable of attaching to these. Looks like > > http://www.xvpsource.org/ is the place to look? > > > > Personally I usually use /opt/xensource/debug/vncproxy (copied to my > > workstation) to create a local socket on my workstation which is > proxied > > to the XCP host and then run vncviewer locally against that proxy. > > To access the raw serial console by text (the equivalent of ''xm create > -c''), you first need to disable the VNC proxy from spawning (set theVM> other-config:disable_pv_vnc field to something), start the VM paused, > and then connect to it directly using xenconsole from dom0, and then > unpause the VM > > I use this small script in dom0 to automate this for a given VM uuid: > http://github.com/avsm/mirage/blob/master/scripts/run_minios > > Although to be honest, for MiniOS work, I just find it far more > convenient to just use the lower-level Python toolstack, and then > switch to XCP for the higher level management stuff. > > -anil_______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel
Phil Winterfield (winterfi)
2010-Mar-29 18:21 UTC
RE: [Xen-devel] Generic PV Guests on XCP?
Ian- I have taken your advice and created a generic template using vm-create, but for some reason it doesn’t like the kernel path, even though it is clearly accessible - see below. Any ideas? Phil [root@xenserver-wvgdltag ~]# xe vm-create name-label=IOSonXen name-description="Paravirtualized IOS on Xen" 5c56afe3-a729-bcaa-a543-d87987167a3d [root@xenserver-wvgdltag ~]# xe vm-param-set uuid=5c56afe3-a729-bcaa-a543-d87987167a3d \> PV-kernel='/boot/ios/i86bi_xen-ipbase-ms' \ > PV-args= \ > PV-bootloader= \ > PV-bootloader-args= \ > memory-static-min=2048 \ > VCPUs-at-startup=1 \ > other-config:pause=1 \ > other-config:disable_pv_vnc=1[root@xenserver-wvgdltag ~]# xe vm-start uuid=5c56afe3-a729-bcaa-a543-d87987167a3d Caller not allowed to perform this operation. message: illegal kernel path /boot/ios/i86bi_xen-ipbase-ms [root@xenserver-wvgdltag ~]# ls -l /boot/ios/i86bi_xen-ipbase-ms -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 61649099 Mar 23 13:37 /boot/ios/i86bi_xen-ipbase-ms [root@xenserver-wvgdltag ~]# _______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel
On Mon, 2010-03-29 at 19:21 +0100, Phil Winterfield (winterfi) wrote:> Ian- > > I have taken your advice and created a generic template using > vm-create, but for some reason it doesn’t like the kernel path, even > though it is clearly accessible - see below. Any ideas?Some security stuff got added to xapi recently which requires that the guest kernel and ramdisk be under "/boot/guest/". I''m not really sure why -- I think it''s because with RBAC non root users with the VM admin role can set PV-kernel/PV-initrd/etc (imagine setting PV-initrd to /etc/shadow) but I''m not sure why restricting to just /boot wasn''t sufficiently secure. If you move (or symlink) your stuff to /boot/guest and use /boot/guest/ios/i86bi_etcetc I think things should work. Ian.> > Phil > > > [root@xenserver-wvgdltag ~]# xe vm-create name-label=IOSonXen name-description="Paravirtualized IOS on Xen" > 5c56afe3-a729-bcaa-a543-d87987167a3d > [root@xenserver-wvgdltag ~]# xe vm-param-set uuid=5c56afe3-a729-bcaa-a543-d87987167a3d \ > > PV-kernel=''/boot/ios/i86bi_xen-ipbase-ms'' \ > > PV-args= \ > > PV-bootloader= \ > > PV-bootloader-args= \ > > memory-static-min=2048 \ > > VCPUs-at-startup=1 \ > > other-config:pause=1 \ > > other-config:disable_pv_vnc=1 > [root@xenserver-wvgdltag ~]# xe vm-start uuid=5c56afe3-a729-bcaa-a543-d87987167a3d > Caller not allowed to perform this operation. > message: illegal kernel path /boot/ios/i86bi_xen-ipbase-ms > [root@xenserver-wvgdltag ~]# ls -l /boot/ios/i86bi_xen-ipbase-ms > -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 61649099 Mar 23 13:37 /boot/ios/i86bi_xen-ipbase-ms > [root@xenserver-wvgdltag ~]# >_______________________________________________ Xen-devel mailing list Xen-devel@lists.xensource.com http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel