NAME¶
virt-install - provision new virtual machines
SYNOPSIS¶
virt-install [OPTION]...
DESCRIPTION¶
virt-install is a command line tool for creating new KVM, Xen, or Linux
container guests using the "libvirt" hypervisor management library.
See the EXAMPLES section at the end of this document to quickly get started.
virt-install tool supports both text based & graphical installations,
using VNC or SDL graphics, or a text serial console. The guest can be
configured to use one or more virtual disks, network interfaces, audio
devices, physical USB or PCI devices, among others.
The installation media can be held locally or remotely on NFS, HTTP, FTP
servers. In the latter case "virt-install" will fetch the minimal
files necessary to kick off the installation process, allowing the guest to
fetch the rest of the OS distribution as needed. PXE booting, and importing an
existing disk image (thus skipping the install phase) are also supported.
Given suitable command line arguments, "virt-install" is capable of
running completely unattended, with the guest 'kickstarting' itself too. This
allows for easy automation of guest installs. An interactive mode is also
available with the --prompt option, but this will only ask for the minimum
required options.
OPTIONS¶
Most options are not required. Minimum requirements are --name, --ram, guest
storage (--disk, --filesystem or --nodisks), and an install option.
- -h, --help
- Show the help message and exit
- --connect=CONNECT
- Connect to a non-default hypervisor. The default connection
is chosen based on the following rules:
- xen
- If running on a host with the Xen kernel (checks against
/proc/xen)
- qemu:///system
- If running on a bare metal kernel as root (needed for KVM
installs)
- qemu:///session
- If running on a bare metal kernel as non-root
It is only necessary to provide the "--connect" argument if this
default prioritization is incorrect, eg if wanting to use QEMU while on a
Xen kernel.
General Options¶
General configuration parameters that apply to all types of guest installs.
- -n NAME, --name=NAME
- Name of the new guest virtual machine instance. This must
be unique amongst all guests known to the hypervisor on the connection,
including those not currently active. To re-define an existing guest, use
the virsh(1) tool to shut it down ('virsh shutdown') & delete ('virsh
undefine') it prior to running "virt-install".
- -r MEMORY, --ram=MEMORY
- Memory to allocate for guest instance in megabytes. If the
hypervisor does not have enough free memory, it is usual for it to
automatically take memory away from the host operating system to satisfy
this allocation.
- --arch=ARCH
- Request a non-native CPU architecture for the guest virtual
machine. If omitted, the host CPU architecture will be used in the
guest.
- --machine=MACHINE
- The machine type to emulate. This will typically not need
to be specified for Xen or KVM, but is useful for choosing machine types
of more exotic architectures.
- -u UUID, --uuid=UUID
- UUID for the guest; if none is given a random UUID will be
generated. If you specify UUID, you should use a 32-digit hexadecimal
number. UUID are intended to be unique across the entire data center, and
indeed world. Bear this in mind if manually specifying a UUID
- --vcpus=VCPUS[,maxvcpus=MAX][,sockets=#][,cores=#][,threads=#]
- Number of virtual cpus to configure for the guest. If
'maxvcpus' is specified, the guest will be able to hotplug up to MAX vcpus
while the guest is running, but will startup with VCPUS.
CPU topology can additionally be specified with sockets, cores, and threads.
If values are omitted, the rest will be autofilled prefering sockets over
cores over threads.
- --cpuset=CPUSET
- Set which physical cpus the guest can use.
"CPUSET" is a comma separated list of numbers, which can also be
specified in ranges or cpus to exclude. Example:
0,2,3,5 : Use processors 0,2,3 and 5
1-5,^3,8 : Use processors 1,2,4,5 and 8
If the value 'auto' is passed, virt-install attempts to automatically
determine an optimal cpu pinning using NUMA data, if available.
- --numatune=NODESET,[mode=MODE]
- Tune NUMA policy for the domain process. Example
invocations
--numatune 1,2,3,4-7
--numatune \"1-3,5\",mode=preferred
Specifies the numa nodes to allocate memory from. This has the same syntax
as "--cpuset" option. mode can be one of 'interleave',
'preferred', or 'strict' (the default). See 'man 8 numactl' for
information about each mode.
The nodeset string must use escaped-quotes if specifying any other
option.
- --cpu
MODEL[,+feature][,-feature][,match=MATCH][,vendor=VENDOR]
- Configure the CPU model and CPU features exposed to the
guest. The only required value is MODEL, which is a valid CPU model as
listed in libvirt's cpu_map.xml file.
Specific CPU features can be specified in a number of ways: using one of
libvirt's feature policy values force, require, optional, disable, or
forbid, or with the shorthand '+feature' and '-feature', which equal
'force=feature' and 'disable=feature' respectively
Some examples:
- --cpu core2duo,+x2apic,disable=vmx
- Expose the core2duo CPU model, force enable x2apic, but do
not expose vmx
- --cpu host
- Expose the host CPUs configuration to the guest. This
enables the guest to take advantage of many of the host CPUs features
(better performance), but may cause issues if migrating the guest to a
host without an identical CPU.
- --description
- Human readable text description of the virtual machine.
This will be stored in the guests XML configuration for access by other
applications.
- --security type=TYPE[,label=LABEL][,relabel=yes|no]
- Configure domain security driver settings. Type can be
either 'static' or 'dynamic'. 'static' configuration requires a security
LABEL. Specifying LABEL without TYPE implies static configuration. To have
libvirt automatically apply your static label, you must specify
relabel=yes.
Installation Method options¶
- -c CDROM, --cdrom=CDROM
- File or device use as a virtual CD-ROM device for fully
virtualized guests. It can be path to an ISO image, or to a CDROM device.
It can also be a URL from which to fetch/access a minimal boot ISO image.
The URLs take the same format as described for the "--location"
argument. If a cdrom has been specified via the "--disk" option,
and neither "--cdrom" nor any other install option is specified,
the "--disk" cdrom is used as the install media.
- -l LOCATION, --location=LOCATION
- Distribution tree installtion source. virt-install can
recognize certain distribution trees and fetches a bootable kernel/initrd
pair to launch the install.
With libvirt 0.9.4 or later, network URL installs work for remote
connections. virt-install will download kernel/initrd to the local
machine, and then upload the media to the remote host. This option
requires the URL to be accessible by both the local and remote host.
The "LOCATION" can take one of the following forms:
- DIRECTORY
- Path to a local directory containing an installable
distribution image
- nfs:host:/path or nfs://host/path
- An NFS server location containing an installable
distribution image
- http://host/path
- An HTTP server location containing an installable
distribution image
- ftp://host/path
- An FTP server location containing an installable
distribution image
- --pxe
- Use the PXE boot protocol to load the initial ramdisk and
kernel for starting the guest installation process.
- --import
- Skip the OS installation process, and build a guest around
an existing disk image. The device used for booting is the first device
specified via "--disk" or "--filesystem".
- --init=INITPATH
- Path to a binary that the container guest will init. If a
root "--filesystem" is has been specified, virt-install will
default to /sbin/init, otherwise will default to /bin/sh.
- --livecd
- Specify that the installation media is a live CD and thus
the guest needs to be configured to boot off the CDROM device permanently.
It may be desirable to also use the "--nodisks" flag in
combination.
- -x EXTRA, --extra-args=EXTRA
- Additional kernel command line arguments to pass to the
installer when performing a guest install from "--location". One
common usage is specifying an anaconda kickstart file for automated
installs, such as --extra-args "ks=http://myserver/my.ks"
- --initrd-inject=PATH
- Add PATH to the root of the initrd fetched with
"--location". This can be used to run an automated install
without requiring a network hosted kickstart file:
--initrd-inject=/path/to/my.ks --extra-args "ks=file:/my.ks"
- --os-type=OS_TYPE
- Optimize the guest configuration for a type of operating
system (ex. 'linux', 'windows'). This will attempt to pick the most
suitable ACPI & APIC settings, optimally supported mouse drivers,
virtio, and generally accommodate other operating system quirks.
By default, virt-install will attempt to auto detect this value from the
install media (currently only supported for URL installs). Autodetection
can be disabled with the special value 'none'
See "--os-variant" for valid options.
- --os-variant=OS_VARIANT
- Further optimize the guest configuration for a specific
operating system variant (ex. 'fedora8', 'winxp'). This parameter is
optional, and does not require an "--os-type" to be specified.
By default, virt-install will attempt to auto detect this value from the
install media (currently only supported for URL installs). Autodetection
can be disabled with the special value 'none'.
If the special value 'list' is passed, virt-install will print the full list
of variant values and exit. The printed format is not a stable interface,
DO NOT PARSE IT.
If the special value 'none' is passed, no os variant is recorded and OS
autodetection is disabled.
Values for some recent OS options are:
- win7 : Microsoft Windows 7
- vista : Microsoft Windows Vista
- winxp64 : Microsoft Windows XP (x86_64)
- winxp : Microsoft Windows XP
- win2k8 : Microsoft Windows Server 2008
- win2k3 : Microsoft Windows Server 2003
- freebsd8 : FreeBSD 8.x
- generic : Generic
- debianwheezy : Debian Wheezy
- debiansqueeze : Debian Squeeze
- debianlenny : Debian Lenny
- fedora16 : Fedora 16
- fedora15 : Fedora 15
- fedora14 : Fedora 14
- mageia1 : Mageia 1 and later
- mes5.1 : Mandriva Enterprise Server 5.1 and later
- mandriva2010 : Mandriva Linux 2010 and later
- rhel6 : Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6
- rhel5.4 : Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.4 or later
- rhel4 : Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4
- sles11 : Suse Linux Enterprise Server 11
- sles10 : Suse Linux Enterprise Server
- opensuse12 : openSuse 12
- opensuse11 : openSuse 11
- ubuntuoneiric : Ubuntu 11.10 (Oneiric Ocelot)
- ubuntunatty : Ubuntu 11.04 (Natty Narwhal)
- ubuntumaverick : Ubuntu 10.10 (Maverick Meerkat)
- ubuntulucid : Ubuntu 10.04 (Lucid Lynx)
- ubuntuhardy : Ubuntu 8.04 LTS (Hardy Heron)
Use '--os-variant list' to see the full OS list
- --boot=BOOTOPTS
- Optionally specify the post-install VM boot configuration.
This option allows specifying a boot device order, permanently booting off
kernel/initrd with option kernel arguments, and enabling a BIOS boot menu
(requires libvirt 0.8.3 or later)
--boot can be specified in addition to other install options (such as
--location, --cdrom, etc.) or can be specified on it's own. In the latter
case, behavior is similar to the --import install option: there is no
'install' phase, the guest is just created and launched as specified.
Some examples:
- --boot cdrom,fd,hd,network,menu=on
- Set the boot device priority as first cdrom, first floppy,
first harddisk, network PXE boot. Additionally enable BIOS boot menu
prompt.
- --boot
kernel=KERNEL,initrd=INITRD,kernel_args="console=/dev/ttyS0"
- Have guest permanently boot off a local kernel/initrd pair,
with the specified kernel options.
Storage Configuration¶
- --disk=DISKOPTS
- Specifies media to use as storage for the guest, with
various options. The general format of a disk string is
--disk opt1=val1,opt2=val2,...
To specify media, the command can either be:
--disk /some/storage/path,opt1=val1
or explicitly specify one of the following arguments:
- path
- A path to some storage media to use, existing or not.
Existing media can be a file or block device. If installing on a remote
host, the existing media must be shared as a libvirt storage volume.
Specifying a non-existent path implies attempting to create the new storage,
and will require specifyng a 'size' value. If the base directory of the
path is a libvirt storage pool on the host, the new storage will be
created as a libvirt storage volume. For remote hosts, the base directory
is required to be a storage pool if using this method.
- pool
- An existing libvirt storage pool name to create new storage
on. Requires specifying a 'size' value.
- vol
- An existing libvirt storage volume to use. This is
specified as 'poolname/volname'.
Other available options:
- device
- Disk device type. Value can be 'cdrom', 'disk', or
'floppy'. Default is 'disk'. If a 'cdrom' is specified, and no install
method is chosen, the cdrom is used as the install media.
- bus
- Disk bus type. Value can be 'ide', 'sata', 'scsi', 'usb',
'virtio' or 'xen'. The default is hypervisor dependent since not all
hypervisors support all bus types.
- perms
- Disk permissions. Value can be 'rw' (Read/Write), 'ro'
(Readonly), or 'sh' (Shared Read/Write). Default is 'rw'
- size
- size (in GB) to use if creating new storage
- sparse
- whether to skip fully allocating newly created storage.
Value is 'true' or 'false'. Default is 'true' (do not fully allocate).
The initial time taken to fully-allocate the guest virtual disk
(sparse=false) will be usually by balanced by faster install times inside
the guest. Thus use of this option is recommended to ensure consistently
high performance and to avoid I/O errors in the guest should the host
filesystem fill up.
- cache
- The cache mode to be used. The host pagecache provides
cache memory. The cache value can be 'none', 'writethrough', or
'writeback'. 'writethrough' provides read caching. 'writeback' provides
read and write caching.
- format
- Image format to be used if creating managed storage. For
file volumes, this can be 'raw', 'qcow2', 'vmdk', etc. See format types in
<http://libvirt.org/storage.html> for possible values. This is often
mapped to the driver_type value as well.
With libvirt 0.8.3 and later, this option should be specified if reusing and
existing disk image, since libvirt does not autodetect storage format as
it is a potential security issue. For example, if reusing an existing
qcow2 image, you will want to specify format=qcow2, otherwise the
hypervisor may not be able to read your disk image.
- driver_name
- Driver name the hypervisor should use when accessing the
specified storage. Typically does not need to be set by the user.
- driver_type
- Driver format/type the hypervisor should use when accessing
the specified storage. Typically does not need to be set by the user.
- io
- Disk IO backend. Can be either "threads" or
"native".
- error_policy
- How guest should react if a write error is encountered. Can
be one of "stop", "ignore", or
"enospace"
- serial
- Serial number of the emulated disk device. This is used in
linux guests to set /dev/disk/by-id symlinks. An example serial number
might be: WD-WMAP9A966149
See the examples section for some uses. This option deprecates
"--file", "--file-size", and
"--nonsparse".
- --filesystem
- Specifies a directory on the host to export to the guest.
The most simple invocation is:
--filesystem /source/on/host,/target/point/in/guest
Which will work for recent QEMU and linux guest OS or LXC containers. For
QEMU, the target point is just a mounting hint in sysfs, so will not be
automatically mounted.
The following explicit options can be specified:
- type
- The type or the source directory. Valid values are 'mount'
(the default) or 'template' for OpenVZ templates.
- mode
- The access mode for the source directory from the guest OS.
Only used with QEMU and type=mount. Valid modes are 'passthrough' (the
default), 'mapped', or 'squash'. See libvirt domain XML documentation for
more info.
- source
- The directory on the host to share.
- target
- The mount location to use in the guest.
- --nodisks
- Request a virtual machine without any local disk storage,
typically used for running 'Live CD' images or installing to network
storage (iSCSI or NFS root).
- -f DISKFILE, --file=DISKFILE
- This option is deprecated in favor of "--disk
path=DISKFILE".
- -s DISKSIZE, --file-size=DISKSIZE
- This option is deprecated in favor of "--disk
...,size=DISKSIZE,..."
- --nonsparse
- This option is deprecated in favor of "--disk
...,sparse=false,..."
Networking Configuration¶
- -w NETWORK, --network=NETWORK,opt1=val1,opt2=val2
- Connect the guest to the host network. The value for
"NETWORK" can take one of 3 formats:
- bridge=BRIDGE
- Connect to a bridge device in the host called
"BRIDGE". Use this option if the host has static networking
config & the guest requires full outbound and inbound connectivity
to/from the LAN. Also use this if live migration will be used with this
guest.
- network=NAME
- Connect to a virtual network in the host called
"NAME". Virtual networks can be listed, created, deleted using
the "virsh" command line tool. In an unmodified install of
"libvirt" there is usually a virtual network with a name of
"default". Use a virtual network if the host has dynamic
networking (eg NetworkManager), or using wireless. The guest will be NATed
to the LAN by whichever connection is active.
- user
- Connect to the LAN using SLIRP. Only use this if running a
QEMU guest as an unprivileged user. This provides a very limited form of
NAT.
If this option is omitted a single NIC will be created in the guest. If there is
a bridge device in the host with a physical interface enslaved, that will be
used for connectivity. Failing that, the virtual network called
"default" will be used. This option can be specified multiple times
to setup more than one NIC.
Other available options are:
- model
- Network device model as seen by the guest. Value can be any
nic model supported by the hypervisor, e.g.: 'e1000', 'rtl8139', 'virtio',
...
- mac
- Fixed MAC address for the guest; If this parameter is
omitted, or the value "RANDOM" is specified a suitable address
will be randomly generated. For Xen virtual machines it is required that
the first 3 pairs in the MAC address be the sequence '00:16:3e', while for
QEMU or KVM virtual machines it must be '52:54:00'.
- --nonetworks
- Request a virtual machine without any network
interfaces.
- -b BRIDGE, --bridge=BRIDGE
- This parameter is deprecated in favour of "--network
bridge=bridge_name".
- -m MAC, --mac=MAC
- This parameter is deprecated in favour of "--network
NETWORK,mac=12:34..."
Graphics Configuration¶
If no graphics option is specified, "virt-install" will default to
'--graphics vnc' if the DISPLAY environment variable is set, otherwise
'--graphics none' is used.
- --graphics TYPE,opt1=arg1,opt2=arg2,...
- Specifies the graphical display configuration. This does
not configure any virtual hardware, just how the guest's graphical display
can be accessed. Typically the user does not need to specify this option,
virt-install will try and choose a useful default, and launch a suitable
connection.
General format of a graphical string is
--graphics TYPE,opt1=arg1,opt2=arg2,...
For example:
--graphics vnc,password=foobar
The supported options are:
- type
- The display type. This is one of:
vnc
Setup a virtual console in the guest and export it as a VNC server in the
host. Unless the "port" parameter is also provided, the VNC
server will run on the first free port number at 5900 or above. The actual
VNC display allocated can be obtained using the "vncdisplay"
command to "virsh" (or virt-viewer(1) can be used which
handles this detail for the use).
sdl
Setup a virtual console in the guest and display an SDL window in the host
to render the output. If the SDL window is closed the guest may be
unconditionally terminated.
spice
Export the guest's console using the Spice protocol. Spice allows advanced
features like audio and USB device streaming, as well as improved
graphical performance.
Using spice graphic type will work as if those arguments were given:
--video qxl --channel spicevmc
none
No graphical console will be allocated for the guest. Fully virtualized
guests (Xen FV or QEmu/KVM) will need to have a text console configured on
the first serial port in the guest (this can be done via the --extra-args
option). Xen PV will set this up automatically. The command 'virsh console
NAME' can be used to connect to the serial device.
- port
- Request a permanent, statically assigned port number for
the guest console. This is used by 'vnc' and 'spice'
- tlsport
- Specify the spice tlsport.
- listen
- Address to listen on for VNC/Spice connections. Default is
typically 127.0.0.1 (localhost only), but some hypervisors allow changing
this globally (for example, the qemu driver default can be changed in
/etc/libvirt/qemu.conf). Use 0.0.0.0 to allow access from other machines.
This is use by 'vnc' and 'spice'
- keymap
- Request that the virtual VNC console be configured to run
with a specific keyboard layout. If the special value 'local' is
specified, virt-install will attempt to configure to use the same keymap
as the local system. A value of 'none' specifically defers to the
hypervisor. Default behavior is hypervisor specific, but typically is the
same as 'local'. This is used by 'vnc'
- password
- Request a VNC password, required at connection time.
Beware, this info may end up in virt-install log files, so don't use an
important password. This is used by 'vnc' and 'spice'
- passwordvalidto
- Set an expiration date for password. After the date/time
has passed, all new graphical connections are denyed until a new password
is set. This is used by 'vnc' and 'spice'
The format for this value is YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS, for example
2011-04-01T14:30:15
- --vnc
- This option is deprecated in favor of "--graphics
vnc,..."
- --vncport=VNCPORT
- This option is deprecated in favor of "--graphics
vnc,port=PORT,..."
- --vnclisten=VNCLISTEN
- This option is deprecated in favor of "--graphics
vnc,listen=LISTEN,..."
- -k KEYMAP, --keymap=KEYMAP
- This option is deprecated in favor of "--graphics
vnc,keymap=KEYMAP,..."
- --sdl
- This option is deprecated in favor of "--graphics
sdl,..."
- --nographics
- This option is deprecated in favor of "--graphics
none"
- --noautoconsole
- Don't automatically try to connect to the guest console.
The default behaviour is to launch a VNC client to display the graphical
console, or to run the "virsh" "console" command to
display the text console. Use of this parameter will disable this
behaviour.
Virtualization Type options¶
Options to override the default virtualization type choices.
- -v, --hvm
- Request the use of full virtualization, if both para &
full virtualization are available on the host. This parameter may not be
available if connecting to a Xen hypervisor on a machine without hardware
virtualization support. This parameter is implied if connecting to a QEMU
based hypervisor.
- -p, --paravirt
- This guest should be a paravirtualized guest. If the host
supports both para & full virtualization, and neither this parameter
nor the "--hvm" are specified, this will be assumed.
- --container
- This guest should be a container type guest. This option is
only required if the hypervisor supports other guest types as well (so for
example this option is the default behavior for LXC and OpenVZ, but is
provided for completeness).
- --virt-type
- The hypervisor to install on. Example choices are kvm,
qemu, xen, or kqemu. Available options are listed via 'virsh capabilities'
in the <domain> tags.
- --accelerate
- Prefer KVM or KQEMU (in that order) if installing a QEMU
guest. This behavior is now the default, and this option is deprecated. To
install a plain QEMU guest, use '--virt-type qemu'
- --noapic
- Force disable APIC for the guest.
- --noacpi
- Force disable ACPI for the guest.
Device Options¶
- --controller=TYPE[,OPTS]
- Attach a controller device to the guest. TYPE is one of:
ide, fdc, scsi, sata, virtio-serial, or
usb.
- model
- Controller model.
- address
- Controller address, current PCI of form
'bus:domain:slot:function'.
- index
- A decimal integer describing in which order the bus
controller is encountered, and to reference the controller bus.
- master
- Applicable to USB companion controllers, to define the
master bus startport.
Example:
- --controller
usb,model=ich9-uhci2,address=0:0:4.7,index=0,master=2
- Adds a ICH9 USB companion controller on PCI address 0:0:4.7
with master bus 0 and first port 2.
- --host-device=HOSTDEV
- Attach a physical host device to the guest. Some example
values for HOSTDEV:
- --host-device pci_0000_00_1b_0
- A node device name via libvirt, as shown by 'virsh
nodedev-list'
- --host-device 001.003
- USB by bus, device (via lsusb).
- --host-device 0x1234:0x5678
- USB by vendor, product (via lsusb).
- --host-device 1f.01.02
- PCI device (via lspci).
- --soundhw MODEL
- Attach a virtual audio device to the guest. MODEL specifies
the emulated sound card model. Possible values are ich6, ac97, es1370,
sb16, pcspk, or default. 'default' will be AC97 if the hypervisor supports
it, otherwise it will be ES1370.
This deprecates the old boolean --sound model (which still works the same as
a single '--soundhw default')
- --watchdog MODEL[,action=ACTION]
- Attach a virtual hardware watchdog device to the guest.
This requires a daemon and device driver in the guest. The watchdog fires
a signal when the virtual machine appears to hung. ACTION specifies what
libvirt will do when the watchdog fires. Values are
- reset
- Forcefully reset the guest (the default)
- poweroff
- Forcefully power off the guest
- pause
- Pause the guest
- none
- Do nothing
- shutdown
- Gracefully shutdown the guest (not recommended, since a
hung guest probably won't respond to a graceful shutdown)
MODEL is the emulated device model: either i6300esb (the default) or ib700. Some
examples:
Use the recommended settings:
--watchdog default
Use the i6300esb with the 'poweroff' action
--watchdog i6300esb,action=poweroff
- --parallel=CHAROPTS
- --serial=CHAROPTS
- Specifies a serial device to attach to the guest, with
various options. The general format of a serial string is
--serial type,opt1=val1,opt2=val2,...
--serial and --parallel devices share all the same options, unless otherwise
noted. Some of the types of character device redirection are:
- --serial pty
- Pseudo TTY. The allocated pty will be listed in the running
guests XML description.
- --serial dev,path=HOSTPATH
- Host device. For serial devices, this could be /dev/ttyS0.
For parallel devices, this could be /dev/parport0.
- --serial file,path=FILENAME
- Write output to FILENAME.
- --serial pipe,path=PIPEPATH
- Named pipe (see pipe(7))
- --serial
tcp,host=HOST:PORT,mode=MODE,protocol=PROTOCOL
- TCP net console. MODE is either 'bind' (wait for
connections on HOST:PORT) or 'connect' (send output to HOST:PORT), default
is 'bind'. HOST defaults to '127.0.0.1', but PORT is required. PROTOCOL
can be either 'raw' or 'telnet' (default 'raw'). If 'telnet', the port
acts like a telnet server or client. Some examples:
Wait for connections on any address, port 4567:
--serial tcp,host=0.0.0.0:4567
Connect to localhost, port 1234:
--serial tcp,host=:1234,mode=connect
Wait for telnet connection on localhost, port 2222. The user could then
connect interactively to this console via 'telnet localhost 2222':
--serial tcp,host=:2222,mode=bind,protocol=telnet
- --serial
udp,host=CONNECT_HOST:PORT,bind_host=BIND_HOST:BIND_PORT
- UDP net console. HOST:PORT is the destination to send
output to (default HOST is '127.0.0.1', PORT is required).
BIND_HOST:BIND_PORT is the optional local address to bind to (default
BIND_HOST is 127.0.0.1, but is only set if BIND_PORT is specified). Some
examples:
Send output to default syslog port (may need to edit /etc/rsyslog.conf
accordingly):
--serial udp,host=:514
Send output to remote host 192.168.10.20, port 4444 (this output can be read
on the remote host using 'nc -u -l 4444'):
--serial udp,host=192.168.10.20:4444
- --serial unix,path=UNIXPATH,mode=MODE
- Unix socket, see unix(7). MODE has similar behavior
and defaults as --serial tcp,mode=MODE
- --channel
- Specifies a communication channel device to connect the
guest and host machine. This option uses the same options as --serial and
--parallel for specifying the host/source end of the channel. Extra
'target' options are used to specify how the guest machine sees the
channel.
Some of the types of character device redirection are:
- --channel
SOURCE,target_type=guestfwd,target_address=HOST:PORT
- Communication channel using QEMU usermode networking stack.
The guest can connect to the channel using the specified HOST:PORT
combination.
- --channel SOURCE,target_type=virtio[,name=NAME]
- Communication channel using virtio serial (requires 2.6.34
or later host and guest). Each instance of a virtio --channel line is
exposed in the guest as /dev/vport0p1, /dev/vport0p2, etc. NAME is
optional metadata, and can be any string, such as
org.linux-kvm.virtioport1. If specified, this will be exposed in the guest
at /sys/class/virtio-ports/vport0p1/NAME
- --channel
spicevmc,target_type=virtio[,name=NAME]
- Communication channel for QEMU spice agent, using virtio
serial (requires 2.6.34 or later host and guest). NAME is optional
metadata, and can be any string, such as the default com.redhat.spice.0
that specifies how the guest will see the channel.
- --console
- Connect a text console between the guest and host. Certain
guest and hypervisor combinations can automatically set up a getty in the
guest, so an out of the box text login can be provided (target_type=xen
for xen paravirt guests, and possibly target_type=virtio in the future).
Example:
- --console pty,target_type=virtio
- Connect a virtio console to the guest, redirected to a PTY
on the host. For supported guests, this exposes /dev/hvc0 in the guest.
See http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Features/VirtioSerial for more info.
virtio console requires libvirt 0.8.3 or later.
- --video=VIDEO
- Specify what video device model will be attached to the
guest. Valid values for VIDEO are hypervisor specific, but some options
for recent kvm are cirrus, vga, qxl, or vmvga (vmware).
- --smartcard=MODE[,OPTS]
- Configure a virtual smartcard device.
Mode is one of host, host-certificates, or passthrough.
Additional options are:
- type
- Character device type to connect to on the host. This is
only applicable for passthrough mode.
An example invocation:
- --smartcard passthrough,type=spicevmc
- Use the smartcard channel of a SPICE graphics device to
pass smartcard info to the guest
- --redirdev=BUS[,OPTS]
- Add a redirected device.
- type
- The redirection type, currently supported is tcp or
spicevmc.
- server
- The TCP server connection details, of the form
'server:port'.
Examples of invocation:
- --redirdev usb,type=tcp,server=localhost:4000
- Add a USB redirected device provided by the TCP server on
'localhost' port 4000.
- --redirdev usb,type=spicevmc
- Add a USB device redirected via a dedicated Spice
channel.
Miscellaneous Options¶
- --autostart
- Set the autostart flag for a domain. This causes the domain
to be started on host boot up.
- --print-xml
- If the requested guest has no install phase (--import,
--boot), print the generated XML instead of defining the guest. By default
this WILL do storage creation (can be disabled with --dry-run).
If the guest has an install phase, you will need to use --print-step to
specify exactly what XML output you want. This option implies
--quiet.
- --print-step
- Acts similarly to --print-xml, except requires specifying
which install step to print XML for. Possible values are 1, 2, 3, or all.
Stage 1 is typically booting from the install media, and stage 2 is
typically the final guest config booting off hardisk. Stage 3 is only
relevant for windows installs, which by default have a second install
stage. This option implies --quiet.
- --noreboot
- Prevent the domain from automatically rebooting after the
install has completed.
- --wait=WAIT
- Amount of time to wait (in minutes) for a VM to complete
its install. Without this option, virt-install will wait for the console
to close (not neccessarily indicating the guest has shutdown), or in the
case of --noautoconsole, simply kick off the install and exit. Any
negative value will make virt-install wait indefinitely, a value of 0
triggers the same results as noautoconsole. If the time limit is exceeded,
virt-install simply exits, leaving the virtual machine in its current
state.
- --force
- Prevent interactive prompts. If the intended prompt was a
yes/no prompt, always say yes. For any other prompts, the application will
exit.
- --dry-run
- Proceed through the guest creation process, but do NOT
create storage devices, change host device configuration, or actually
teach libvirt about the guest. virt-install may still fetch install media,
since this is required to properly detect the OS to install.
- --prompt
- Specifically enable prompting for required information.
Default prompting is off (as of virtinst 0.400.0)
- --check-cpu
- Check that the number virtual cpus requested does not
exceed physical CPUs and warn if they do.
- -q, --quiet
- Only print fatal error messages.
- -d, --debug
- Print debugging information to the terminal when running
the install process. The debugging information is also stored in
"$HOME/.virtinst/virt-install.log" even if this parameter is
omitted.
EXAMPLES¶
Install a Fedora 13 KVM guest with virtio accelerated disk/network, creating a
new 8GB storage file, installing from media in the hosts CDROM drive, auto
launching a graphical VNC viewer
# virt-install \
--connect qemu:///system \
--virt-type kvm \
--name demo \
--ram 500 \
--disk path=/var/lib/libvirt/images/demo.img,size=8 \
--graphics vnc \
--cdrom /dev/cdrom \
--os-variant fedora13
Install a Fedora 9 plain QEMU guest, using LVM partition, virtual networking,
booting from PXE, using VNC server/viewer
# virt-install \
--connect qemu:///system \
--name demo \
--ram 500 \
--disk path=/dev/HostVG/DemoVM \
--network network=default \
--virt-type qemu
--graphics vnc \
--os-variant fedora9
Install a guest with a real partition, with the default QEMU hypervisor for a
different architecture using SDL graphics, using a remote kernel and initrd
pair:
# virt-install \
--connect qemu:///system \
--name demo \
--ram 500 \
--disk path=/dev/hdc \
--network bridge=eth1 \
--arch ppc64 \
--graphics sdl \
--location http://download.fedora.redhat.com/pub/fedora/linux/core/6/x86_64/os/
Run a Live CD image under Xen fullyvirt, in diskless environment
# virt-install \
--hvm \
--name demo \
--ram 500 \
--nodisks \
--livecd \
--graphics vnc \
--cdrom /root/fedora7live.iso
Run /usr/bin/httpd in a linux container guest (LXC). Resource usage is capped at
512 MB of ram and 2 host cpus:
# virt-install \
--connect lxc:/// \
--name httpd_guest \
--ram 512 \
--vcpus 2 \
--init /usr/bin/httpd
Install a paravirtualized Xen guest, 500 MB of RAM, a 5 GB of disk, and Fedora
Core 6 from a web server, in text-only mode, with old style --file options:
# virt-install \
--paravirt \
--name demo \
--ram 500 \
--file /var/lib/xen/images/demo.img \
--file-size 6 \
--graphics none \
--location http://download.fedora.redhat.com/pub/fedora/linux/core/6/x86_64/os/
Create a guest from an existing disk image 'mydisk.img' using defaults for the
rest of the options.
# virt-install \
--name demo
--ram 512
--disk /home/user/VMs/mydisk.img
--import
Test a custom kernel/initrd using an existing disk image, manually specifying a
serial device hooked to a PTY on the host machine.
# virt-install \
--name mykernel
--ram 512
--disk /home/user/VMs/mydisk.img
--boot kernel=/tmp/mykernel,initrd=/tmp/myinitrd,kernel_args="console=ttyS0"
--serial pty
AUTHORS¶
Written by Daniel P. Berrange, Hugh Brock, Jeremy Katz, Cole Robinson and a team
of many other contributors. See the AUTHORS file in the source distribution
for the complete list of credits.
BUGS¶
Please see
http://virt-manager.org/page/BugReporting
COPYRIGHT¶
Copyright (C) 2006-2011 Red Hat, Inc, and various contributors. This is free
software. You may redistribute copies of it under the terms of the GNU General
Public License "
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html". There is NO
WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.
SEE ALSO¶
virsh(1), "
virt-clone(1)", "
virt-manager(1)", the project
website "
http://virt-manager.org"