Xen users - Jul 2009 - Physical H/W Port on Thin Client <-> Virtual Hardware under Xen VM Guest.

Hi All.

-- my first post on this esteem list -- :)

I have Xen-3.3 working very well on a four core Phenom-II system with  
8GB with over 20 concurrent OS guests.

I am trying to set up a student LAB which will allow students to  
experiment with H/W via assigned virtual guests (physically distant  
for the virtual host).

The requirement is to have h/w (say a USB2 port) on thin client box A  
(elsewhere on the intranet) to seen as actual hardware on a virtual  
guest OS under Xen.
Why? We want to use unmodified 3rd party applications running on Xen  
guests, by assigning thin client h/w ports [USB, Serial or Parallel]   
for example a AVR hardware debugger connected to USB2 on a thin  
client, assigned to a virtual port on the VM guest.

Is such a setup possible?

Is anyone on this list aware of any open source s/w that approaches  
such a concept?

If so, I would use it as a basis to develop further models of virtual  
h/w connection to physical port.

Any assistance will be most appreciated.
Thanks. Grahame 
  

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> 
> Hi All.
> 
> -- my first post on this esteem list -- :)
> 
> I have Xen-3.3 working very well on a four core Phenom-II system with
> 8GB with over 20 concurrent OS guests.
> 
> I am trying to set up a student LAB which will allow students to
> experiment with H/W via assigned virtual guests (physically distant
> for the virtual host).
> 
> The requirement is to have h/w (say a USB2 port) on thin client box A
> (elsewhere on the intranet) to seen as actual hardware on a virtual
> guest OS under Xen.
> Why? We want to use unmodified 3rd party applications running on Xen
> guests, by assigning thin client h/w ports [USB, Serial or Parallel]
> for example a AVR hardware debugger connected to USB2 on a thin
> client, assigned to a virtual port on the VM guest.
> 
> Is such a setup possible?
What operating systems is everything using (eg your DomU''s and your
thin
clients)?

James

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Thanks for your input James.

I am especially looking forward to your implementation of passthrough  
USB.

In the meantime I will have a look around for Linux USB over IP, and  
give it a go.

Cheers. Grahame

On 29/07/2009, at 8:38 PM, James Harper wrote:
>>
>> Hi James.
>>
>> My DomU is XPproSP3, and the thin clients are currently Linux using
>> SSH booted off a USB stick.
>
> Hmmm... well USB over IP is in Linux, so you could maybe run the  
> USBoIP
> server on your thin client to export a USB device to the XP server.  
> I''m
> not sure what the level of support is for the Windows client of USBoIP
> but it does exist. Have a look in the staging directory of the current
> linux tree.
>
> Failing that, at some point I will implement passthrough USB into  
> GPLPV
> so you could use USBoIP on the thin client and Dom0 and then pass
> through the device from Dom0 to DomU.
>
> Sounds like a bit of mucking around.
>
> James

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