On Sun, Jan 11, 2009 at 10:38 AM, Greg KH
On Sun, Jan 11, 2009 at 04:07:25PM +0000, Rob OpenSuSE wrote:
2009/1/11 Marcus Meissner
: On Sun, Jan 11, 2009 at 01:45:27AM -0500, Putrycz, Erik wrote: Do you mean there's a kernel in the kernel-base rpm, that is intented for virtualised environments?
Yes, it can be used that way.
But note, it doesn't have the vmware drivers as they violate the GPL and can not be redistributed, and virtualbox drivers, well, let's just say some of us looked at that code, and ran away screaming :)
But for KVM or Xen, this package should work. If not, please let us know.
Hi Greg,
Ignoring for a second the kernel modules required to support host
access, what I was thinking was a kernel that implemented, for
example.. Intel PIIX3/4 ATA, AHCI, Fusion MPT (for VMware), Intel AC97
audio and ES1371 audio, you know.. the hardware that you can pick in
boxes from VMware or VirtualBox or whatever other emulation
environment. The hardware it mimics on it's fake PCI bus etc. :)
vmware-tools, virtualbox kernel drivers, either in weird package forms
built by script, or KMPs, are something you generally have to pull in
once the OS is installed (I've not yet seen any distribution - for
licensing reasons or otherwise - provide any virtualization host-guest
toolkit by default on the installation DVD). This is fine. But for the
basic install and the basic kernel and the built initrd, why include
40 PCI ethernet cards, 10 framebuffer drivers, ATA drivers for every
southbridge on the planet, things like PCI DVB adapters and server
hardware such as Infiniband.. which.. it simply does not provide on
it's virtual PCI bus? Since VirtualBox is based on QEMU and shares a
lot of the physical device emulation, and VirtualBox and VMware tend
to assume a certain subset of drivers are all an emulated system need
have to boot, get through and installer and bring up Windows before
host-guest tools are installed, those decisions in the design of the
emulators would mean a more efficient, leaner kernel could be built
with less drivers, less kernel build time, less boot time, far less
bothersome modules to be "autoloaded" (it's not like you can hotplug a
virtual PCI card in any of them, none of the emulators expose anything
cpufreq can use, etc.)
--
Matt Sealey