Re: [PATCH] KVM: Add wrapper script around QEMU to test kernels

[Pekka Enberg <penberg@kernel.org>]

On Mon, Nov 7, 2011 at 12:11 PM, Gerd Hoffmann <kraxel@redhat.com> wrote:
> No support for booting from CDROM.
> No support for booting from Network.
> Thus no way to install a new guest image.

Sure. It's a pain point which we need to fix.

On Mon, Nov 7, 2011 at 12:11 PM, Gerd Hoffmann <kraxel@redhat.com> wrote:
> Booting an existing qcow2 guest image failed, the guest started throwing
> I/O errors.  And even to try that I had to manually extract the kernel
> and initrd images from the guest.  Maybe you should check with the Xen
> guys, they have a funky 'pygrub' which sort-of automates the
> copy-kernel-from-guest-image process.

QCOW2 support is experimental. The I/O errors are caused by forced
read-only mode.

On Mon, Nov 7, 2011 at 12:11 PM, Gerd Hoffmann <kraxel@redhat.com> wrote:
> Booting the host kernel failed too.  Standard distro kernel.  The virtio
> bits are modular, not statically compiled into the kernel.  kvm tool
> can't handle that.

I think we have some support for booting modular distro kernels too if
you tell KVM tool where to find initrd. It sucks out-of-the-box though
because nobody seems to be using it.

On Mon, Nov 7, 2011 at 12:11 PM, Gerd Hoffmann <kraxel@redhat.com> wrote:
> You have to build your own kernel and make sure you flip the correct
> config bits, then you can boot it to a shell prompt.  Trying anything
> else just doesn't work today ...

What can I say? Patches welcome? :-)

                        Pekka