Libvirt/QEMU guest

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This article covers libvirt and its creation of a virtual machine (VM) for use under the soft-emulation mode QEMU hypervisor Type-2, notably using virsh command.

The virsh command and its configuration toward the creation of an strict-emulation-mode virtual machine that an QEMU-capable operating system to be installed on.

Installation

Note
Use QEMU to install app-emulation/qemu and Libvirt to install app-emulation/libvirt. Once installed, return to this guide.

Verify system is capable of being a virtualization host.

root #virt-host-validate

  QEMU: Checking for hardware virtualization                                 : PASS
  QEMU: Checking if device /dev/kvm exists                                   : PASS
  QEMU: Checking if device /dev/kvm is accessible                            : PASS
  QEMU: Checking if device /dev/vhost-net exists                             : PASS
  QEMU: Checking if device /dev/net/tun exists                               : PASS
  QEMU: Checking for cgroup 'cpu' controller support                         : PASS
  QEMU: Checking for cgroup 'cpuacct' controller support                     : PASS
  QEMU: Checking for cgroup 'cpuset' controller support                      : PASS
  QEMU: Checking for cgroup 'memory' controller support                      : PASS
  QEMU: Checking for cgroup 'devices' controller support                     : PASS
  QEMU: Checking for cgroup 'blkio' controller support                       : PASS
  QEMU: Checking for device assignment IOMMU support                         : PASS
  QEMU: Checking if IOMMU is enabled by kernel                               : PASS
  QEMU: Checking for secure guest support                                    : WARN (Unknown if this platform has Secure Guest support)
    CH: Checking for hardware virtualization                                 : PASS
    CH: Checking if device /dev/kvm exists                                   : PASS
    CH: Checking if device /dev/kvm is accessible                            : PASS

Usage

List virtual machines (domains)

root #virsh list --all

 Id   Name                  State
-------------------------------------
 1    gentoo                running

Shutdown a virtual machine

Graceful shutdown, similar to pressing the power button on a physical machine.

root #virsh shutdown <vm-id>

Hard shutdown, similar to pulling the power cord on a physical machine.

root #virsh destroy <vm-id>

See also

• Virtualization — the concept and technique that permits running software in an environment separate from a computer operating system.
• QEMU — a generic, open source hardware emulator and virtualization suite.
• QEMU/QEMU front-ends

• Libvirt — a virtualization management toolkit.
• Libvirt/QEMU_networking — details the setup of Gentoo networking by Libvirt for use by guest containers and QEMU-based virtual machines.

• Virt-manager — desktop user interface for management of virtual machines and containers through the libvirt library
• Virt-manager/QEMU_guest — QEMU creation of a guest (VM or container)

• QEMU/Linux guest — describes the setup of a Gentoo Linux guest in QEMU using Gentoo bootable media.