More vcd info wanted

More vcd info wanted

[Bill Davidsen]

I am looking for detailed information or a single reproducible example of 
starting a VM using the qemu-kvm command from a script under Linux (and a 
display script on a control host, obviously). What software needs to be 
installed and running on the host, and what needs to be on the remote accessing 
display.

Please: this is not a question about doing something else using some other 
method, I need to be able to drop a disk image and a few parameters into a KVM 
host and start it in such a way that there is not human intervention nor 
previous preparation such as virt-manager or similar.

I run desktops and servers under KVM using both command line start and managers, 
I just keep running into documentation which tells me to use a "vnc specifier" 
without explanation of what that might look like or a single reproducible 
example of same.

The host will be given a disk image and some parameters such as MAC address and 
memory size, and the machine which will have the display. That's my starting 
point, KVM host info will be used to start the viewer on another machine.

-- 
Bill Davidsen <davidsen@tmr.com>
   "We have more to fear from the bungling of the incompetent than from
the machinations of the wicked."  - from Slashdot

Re: More vcd info wanted

[Ryan Harper]

* Bill Davidsen <davidsen@tmr.com> [2009-03-30 15:51]:
> I am looking for detailed information or a single reproducible example of 
> starting a VM using the qemu-kvm command from a script under Linux (and a 
> display script on a control host, obviously). What software needs to be 
> installed and running on the host, and what needs to be on the remote 
> accessing display.
> 
> Please: this is not a question about doing something else using some other 
> method, I need to be able to drop a disk image and a few parameters into a 
> KVM host and start it in such a way that there is not human intervention 
> nor previous preparation such as virt-manager or similar.
> 
> I run desktops and servers under KVM using both command line start and 
> managers, I just keep running into documentation which tells me to use a 
> "vnc specifier" without explanation of what that might look like or a 
> single reproducible example of same.

-vnc localhost:1 -- will display the guest VGA display on the localhost.
A remote system can do:

vncviewer ${kvmhost}:1 

to view the guest VGA.

> 
> The host will be given a disk image and some parameters such as MAC address 
> and memory size, and the machine which will have the display. That's my 
> starting point, KVM host info will be used to start the viewer on another 
> machine.
> 
> -- 
> Bill Davidsen <davidsen@tmr.com>
>   "We have more to fear from the bungling of the incompetent than from
> the machinations of the wicked."  - from Slashdot
> --
> To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe kvm" in
> the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org
> More majordomo info at  http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html

-- 
Ryan Harper
Software Engineer; Linux Technology Center
IBM Corp., Austin, Tx
ryanh@us.ibm.com

Re: More vcd info wanted

[Bill Davidsen]

Ryan Harper wrote:
> * Bill Davidsen <davidsen@tmr.com> [2009-03-30 15:51]:
>> I am looking for detailed information or a single reproducible example of 
>> starting a VM using the qemu-kvm command from a script under Linux (and a 
>> display script on a control host, obviously). What software needs to be 
>> installed and running on the host, and what needs to be on the remote 
>> accessing display.
>>
>> Please: this is not a question about doing something else using some other 
>> method, I need to be able to drop a disk image and a few parameters into a 
>> KVM host and start it in such a way that there is not human intervention 
>> nor previous preparation such as virt-manager or similar.
>>
>> I run desktops and servers under KVM using both command line start and 
>> managers, I just keep running into documentation which tells me to use a 
>> "vnc specifier" without explanation of what that might look like or a 
>> single reproducible example of same.
> 
> -vnc localhost:1 -- will display the guest VGA display on the localhost.
> A remote system can do:
> 
> vncviewer ${kvmhost}:1 
> 
> to view the guest VGA.
> 
Thanks, will try later tonight. Have to have a bit of care getting the number 
right (unique) since there might be more than one of these, but this may be all 
I need.

>> The host will be given a disk image and some parameters such as MAC address 
>> and memory size, and the machine which will have the display. That's my 
>> starting point, KVM host info will be used to start the viewer on another 
>> machine.
>>

-- 
Bill Davidsen <davidsen@tmr.com>
   "We have more to fear from the bungling of the incompetent than from
the machinations of the wicked."  - from Slashdot

Re: More vcd info wanted

[Anthony Liguori]

Ryan Harper wrote:
> * Bill Davidsen <davidsen@tmr.com> [2009-03-30 15:51]:
>   
>> I am looking for detailed information or a single reproducible example of 
>> starting a VM using the qemu-kvm command from a script under Linux (and a 
>> display script on a control host, obviously). What software needs to be 
>> installed and running on the host, and what needs to be on the remote 
>> accessing display.
>>
>> Please: this is not a question about doing something else using some other 
>> method, I need to be able to drop a disk image and a few parameters into a 
>> KVM host and start it in such a way that there is not human intervention 
>> nor previous preparation such as virt-manager or similar.
>>
>> I run desktops and servers under KVM using both command line start and 
>> managers, I just keep running into documentation which tells me to use a 
>> "vnc specifier" without explanation of what that might look like or a 
>> single reproducible example of same.
>>     
>
> -vnc localhost:1 -- will display the guest VGA display on the localhost.
> A remote system can do:
>
> vncviewer ${kvmhost}:1 
>   

If you say -vnc localhost:1, then vncviewer ${kvmhost}:1 will certainly 
not work.

You have to say -vnc :1, then vncviewer ${kvmhost}:1.

And happiness will ensue by s/vncviewer/vinagre/.

Regards,

Anthony Liguori

Re: More vcd info wanted

[Charles Duffy]

Bill Davidsen wrote:
> Ryan Harper wrote:
>> -vnc localhost:1 -- will display the guest VGA display on the localhost.
>> A remote system can do:
>>
>> vncviewer ${kvmhost}:1
>> to view the guest VGA.
>>
> Thanks, will try later tonight. Have to have a bit of care getting the 
> number right (unique) since there might be more than one of these, but 
> this may be all I need.

You might consider using libvirt, which (among many other relevant 
features) can dynamically assign VNC ports (thus managing the uniqueness 
constraint) and will expose the currently selected port as part of the 
domain's XML configuration. (Getting a VNC viewer going with libvirt is 
considerably easier than that, though -- "virt-viewer VM_NAME" will do 
the trick).