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documentation.suse.com / SUSE Linux Enterprise Server-Dokumentation / Virtualization Guide / XM, XL Toolstacks and Libvirt framework
Applies to SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15 SP2

C XM, XL Toolstacks and Libvirt framework

C.1 Xen Toolstacks

Since the early Xen 2.x releases, xend has been the de facto toolstack for managing Xen installations. In Xen 4.1, a new toolstack called libxenlight (also known as libxl) was introduced with technology preview status. libxl is a small, low-level library written in C. It has been designed to provide a simple API for all client toolstacks (XAPI, libvirt, xl). In Xen 4.2, libxl was promoted to supported status and xend was marked deprecated. xend has been included in the Xen 4.3 and 4.4 series to give users enough time to convert their tooling to libxl. It has been removed from the upstream Xen project and will no longer be provided starting with the Xen 4.5 series and SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 12 SP1.

Although SLES 11 SP3 contains Xen 4.2, SUSE retained the xend toolstack since making such an invasive change in a service pack would be too disruptive for SUSE Linux Enterprise customers. However, SLES 12 provides a suitable opportunity to move to the new libxl toolstack and remove the deprecated, unmaintained xend stack. Starting with SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 12 SP1, xend is no longer supported.

One of the major differences between xend and libxl is that the former is stateful, while the latter is stateless. With xend, all client applications such as xm and libvirt see the same system state. xend is responsible for maintaining state for the entire Xen host. In libxl, client applications such as xl or libvirt must maintain state. Thus domains created with xl or not visible or known to other libxl applications such as libvirt. Generally, it is discouraged to mix and match libxl applications and is preferred that a single libxl application be used to manage a Xen host. In SUSE Linux Enterprise Server, we recommend to use libvirt to manage Xen hosts. This allows management of the Xen system through libvirt applications such as virt-manager, virt-install, virt-viewer, libguestfs, etc. If xl is used to manage the Xen host, any virtual machines under its management will not be accessible to libvirt. Hence, they are not accessible to any of the libvirt applications.

C.1.1 Upgrading from xend/xm to xl/libxl

The xl application, along with its configuration format (see man xl.cfg), was designed to be backward-compatible with the xm application and its configuration format (see man xm.cfg). Existing xm configuration should be usable with xl. Since libxl is stateless, and xl does not support the notion of managed domains, SUSE recommends using libvirt to manage Xen hosts. SUSE has provided a tool called xen2libvirt, which provides a simple mechanism to import domains previously managed by xend into libvirt. See Section C.2, “Import Xen Domain Configuration into libvirt for more information on xen2libvirt.

C.1.2 XL design

The basic structure of every xl command is:

xl subcommand OPTIONS DOMAIN

DOMAIN is the numeric domain id, or the domain name (which will be internally translated to domain id), and OPTIONS are subcommand specific options.

Although xl/libxl was designed to be backward-compatible with xm/xend, there are a few differences that should be noted:

  • Managed or persistent domains. libvirt now provides this functionality.

  • xl/libxl does not support Python code in the domain configuration files.

  • xl/libxl does not support creating domains from SXP format configuration files (xm create -F).

  • xl/libxl does not support sharing storage across DomU's via w! in domain configuration files.

xl/libxl is relatively new and under heavy development, hence a few features are still missing with regard to the xm/xend toolstack:

  • SCSI LUN/Host pass-through (PVSCSI)

  • USB pass-through (PVUSB)

  • Direct Kernel Boot for fully virtualized Linux guests for Xen

C.1.3 Checklist before Upgrade

Before upgrading a SLES 11 SP4 Xen host to SLES 15:

  • You must remove any Python code from your xm domain configuration files.

  • It is recommended to capture the libvirt domain XML from all existing virtual machines using virsh dumpxml DOMAIN_NAME DOMAIN_NAME.xml.

  • It is recommended to do a backup of /etc/xen/xend-config.sxp and /boot/grub/menu.lst files to keep references of previous parameters used for Xen.

Note
Note

Currently, live migrating virtual machines running on a SLES 11 SP4 Xen host to a SLES 15 Xen host is not supported. The xend and libxl toolstacks are not runtime-compatible. Virtual machine downtime will be required to move the virtual machines.

C.2 Import Xen Domain Configuration into libvirt

xen2libvirt is a command line tool to import legacy Xen domain configuration into the libvirt virtualization library (see The Virtualization book for more information on libvirt). xen2libvirt provides an easy way to import domains managed by the deprecated xm/xend tool stack into the new libvirt/libxl tool stack. Several domains can be imported at once using its --recursive mode

xen2libvirt is included in the xen-tools package. If needed, install it with

> sudo zypper install xen-tools

xen2libvirt general syntax is

xen2libvirt <options> /path/to/domain/config

where options can be:

-h, --help

Prints short information about xen2libvirt usage.

-c, --convert-only

Converts the domain configuration to the libvirt XML format, but does not do the import to libvirt.

-r, --recursive

Converts and/or imports all domains configuration recursively, starting at the specified path.

-f, --format

Specifies the format of the source domain configuration. Can be either xm, or sexpr (S-expression format).

-v, --verbose

Prints more detailed information about the import process.

Example C.1: Converting Xen Domain Configuration to libvirt

Suppose you have a Xen domain managed with xm with the following configuration saved in /etc/xen/sle12.xm:

kernel = "/boot/vmlinuz-2.6-xenU"
  memory = 128
  name = "SLE12"
  root = "/dev/hda1 ro"
  disk = [ "file:/var/xen/sle12.img,hda1,w" ]

Convert it to libvirt XML without importing it, and look at its content:

> sudo xen2libvirt -f xm -c /etc/xen/sle12.xm > /etc/libvirt/qemu/sles12.xml
  # cat /etc/libvirt/qemu/sles12.xml
  <domain type='xen'>
  <name>SLE12</name>
  <uuid>43e1863c-8116-469c-a253-83d8be09aa1d</uuid>
  <memory unit='KiB'>131072</memory>
  <currentMemory unit='KiB'>131072</currentMemory>
  <vcpu placement='static'>1</vcpu>
  <os>
  <type arch='x86_64' machine='xenpv'>linux</type>
  <kernel>/boot/vmlinuz-2.6-xenU</kernel>
  </os>
  <clock offset='utc' adjustment='reset'/>
  <on_poweroff>destroy</on_poweroff>
  <on_reboot>restart</on_reboot>
  <on_crash>restart</on_crash>
  <devices>
  <disk type='file' device='disk'>
  <driver name='file'/>
  <source file='/var/xen/sle12.img'/>
  <target dev='hda1' bus='xen'/>
  </disk>
  <console type='pty'>
  <target type='xen' port='0'/>
  </console>
  </devices>
  </domain>

To import the domain into libvirt, you can either run the same xen2libvirt command without the -c option, or use the exported file /etc/libvirt/qemu/sles12.xml and define a new Xen domain using virsh:

> sudo virsh define /etc/libvirt/qemu/sles12.xml

C.3 Differences between the xm and xl Applications

The purpose of this chapter is to list all differences between xm and xl applications. Generally, xl is designed to be compatible with xm. Replacing xm with xl in custom scripts or tools is usually sufficient.

You can also use the libvirt framework using the virsh command. In this documentation only the first OPTION for virsh will be shown. To get more help on this option do a:

virsh help OPTION

C.3.1 Notation Conventions

To easily understand the difference between xl and xm commands, the following notation is used in this section:

Table C.1: Notation Conventions

Notation

Meaning

(-) minus

Option exists in xm, but xl does not include it.

(+) plus

Option exists in xl, but xm does not include it.

C.3.2 New Global Options

Table C.2: New Global Options

Options

Task

(+) -v

Verbose, increase the verbosity of the output

(+) -N

Dry run, do not actually execute the command

(+) -f

Force execution. xl will refuse to run some commands if it detects that xend is also running, this option will force the execution of those commands, even though it is unsafe

C.3.3 Unchanged Options

List of common options of xl and xm, and their libvirt equivalents.

Table C.3: Common Options

Options

Task

libvirt equivalent

destroy DOMAIN

Immediately terminate the domain.

virsh destroy

domid DOMAIN_NAME

Convert a domain name to a DOMAIN_ID.

virsh domid

domname DOMAIN_ID

Convert a DOMAIN_ID to a DOMAIN_NAME.

virsh domname

help

Display the short help message (that is, common commands).

virsh help

pause DOMAIN_ID

Pause a domain. When in a paused state, the domain will still consume allocated resources such as memory, but will not be eligible for scheduling by the Xen hypervisor.

virsh suspend

unpause DOMAIN_ID

Move a domain out of the paused state. This will allow a previously paused domain to be eligible for scheduling by the Xen hypervisor.

virsh resume

rename DOMAIN_ID NEW_DOMAIN_NAME

Change the domain name of DOMAIN_ID to NEW_DOMAIN_NAME.

  1. > virsh dumpxml DOMAINNAME >
              DOMXML
  2. modify the domain's name in DOMXML

  3. > virsh undefine DOMAINNAME
  4. > virsh define DOMAINNAME

sysrq DOMAIN <letter>

Send a Magic System Request to the domain, each type of request is represented by a different letter. It can be used to send SysRq requests to Linux guests, see https://www.kernel.org/doc/html/latest/admin-guide/sysrq.html for more information. It requires PV drivers to be installed in your guest OS.

virsh send-keys can send Magic Sys Req only for KVM

vncviewer OPTIONS DOMAIN

Attach to domain's VNC server, forking a vncviewer process.

virt-viewer DOMAIN_ID

virsh VNCDISPLAY

vcpu-set DOMAIN_ID VCPUS

Set the number of virtual CPUs for the domain in question. Like mem-set, this command can only allocate up to the maximum virtual CPU count configured at boot for the domain.

virsh setvcpus

vcpu-list DOMAIN_ID

List VCPU information for a specific domain. If no domain is specified, VCPU information for all domains will be provided.

virsh vcpuinfo

vcpu-pin DOMAIN_ID <VCPU|all> <CPUs|all>

Pin the VCPU to only run on the specific CPUs. The keyword all can be used to apply the CPU list to all VCPUs in the domain.

virsh vcpupin

dmesg [-c]

Read the Xen message buffer, similar to dmesg on a Linux system. The buffer contains informational, warning, and error messages created during Xen's boot process.

top

Execute the xentop command, which provides real time monitoring of domains. xentop is a curses interface.

virsh nodecpustats

virsh nodememstats

uptime [-s] DOMAIN

Print the current uptime of the domains running. With the xl command, the DOMAIN argument is mandatory.

debug-keys KEYS

Send debug keys to Xen. It is the same as pressing the Xen conswitch (Ctrl-A by default) three times and then pressing "keys".

cpupool-migrate DOMAIN CPU_POOL

Move a domain specified by DOMAIN_ID or DOMAIN into a CPU_POOL.

cpupool-destroy CPU_POOL

Deactivate a cpu pool. This is possible only if no domain is active in the cpu-pool.

block-detach DOMAIN_ID DevId

Detach a domain's virtual block device. devid may be the symbolic name or the numeric device id given to the device by Dom0. You will need to run xl block-list to determine that number.

virsh detach-disk

network-attach DOMAIN_ID NETWORK_DEVICE

Create a new network device in the domain specified by DOMAIN_ID. network-device describes the device to attach, using the same format as the vif string in the domain configuration file

virsh attach-interface

virsh attach-device

pci-attach DOMAIN <BDF> [Virtual Slot]

Hotplug a new pass-through PCI device to the specified domain. BDF is the PCI Bus/Device/Function of the physical device to be passed through.

virsh attach-device

pci-list DOMAIN_ID

List pass-through PCI devices for a domain

getenforce

Determine if the FLASK security module is loaded and enforcing its policy.

setenforce <1|0|Enforcing|Permissive>

Enable or disable enforcing of the FLASK access controls. The default is permissive and can be changed using the flask_enforcing option on the hypervisor's command line.

C.3.4 Removed Options

List of xm options which are no more available with the XL tool stack and a replacement solution if available.

C.3.4.1 Domain Management

The list of Domain management removed command and their replacement.

Table C.4: Domain Management Removed Options

Domain Management Removed Options

Options

Task

Equivalent

(-) log

Print the Xend log.

This log file can be found in /var/log/xend.log

(-) delete

Remove a domain from Xend domain management. The list option shows the domain names

virsh undefine

(-) new

Adds a domain to Xend domain management

virsh define

(-) start

Start a Xend managed domain that was added using the xm new command

virsh start

(-) dryrun

Dry run - prints the resulting configuration in SXP but does not create the domain

xl -N

(-) reset

Reset a domain

virsh reset

(-) domstate

Show domain state

virsh domstate

(-) serve

Proxy Xend XMLRPC over stdio

(-) resume DOMAIN OPTIONS

Moves a domain out of the suspended state and back into memory

virsh resume

(-) suspend DOMAIN

Suspend a domain to a state file so that it can be later resumed using the resume subcommand. Similar to the save subcommand although the state file may not be specified

virsh managedsave

virsh suspend

C.3.4.2 USB Devices

USB options are not available with xl/libxl tool stack. virsh has the attach-device and detach-device options but it does not work yet with USB.

Table C.5: USB Devices Management Removed Options

USB Devices Management Removed Options

Options

Task

(-) usb-add

Add a new USB physical bus to a domain

(-) usb-del

Delete a USB physical bus from a domain

(-) usb-attach

Attach a new USB physical bus to domain's virtual port

(-) usb-detach

Detach a USB physical bus from domain's virtual port

(-) usb-list

List domain's attachment state of all virtual port

(-) usb-list-assignable-devices

List all the assignable USB devices

(-) usb-hc-create

Create a domain's new virtual USB host controller

(-) usb-hc-destroy

Destroy a domain's virtual USB host controller

C.3.4.3 CPU Management

CPU management options has changed. New options are available, see: Section C.3.5.10, “xl cpupool-*

Table C.6: CPU Management Removed options

CPU Management Removed Options

Options

Task

(-) cpupool-new

Adds a CPU pool to Xend CPU pool management

(-) cpupool-start

Starts a Xend CPU pool

(-) cpupool-delete

Removes a CPU pool from Xend management

C.3.4.4 Other Options

Table C.7: Other Options

Other Removed Options

Options

Task

(-) shell

Launch an interactive shell

(-) change-vnc-passwd

Change vnc password

(-) vtpm-list

List virtual TPM devices

(-) block-configure

Change block device configuration

C.3.5 Changed Options

C.3.5.1 create

xl create CONFIG_FILE OPTIONS VARS

Note
Note: libvirt Equivalent:

virsh create

Table C.8: xl create Changed Options

create Changed Options

Options

Task

(*) -f=FILE, --defconfig=FILE

Use the given configuration file

Table C.9: xm create Removed Options

create Removed Options

Options

Task

(-) -s, --skipdtd

Skip DTD checking - skips checks on XML before creating

(-) -x, --xmldryrun

XML dry run

(-) -F=FILE, --config=FILE

Use the given SXP formatted configuration script

(-) --path

Search path for configuration scripts

(-) --help_config

Print the available configuration variables (vars) for the configuration script

(-) -n, --dryrun

Dry run — prints the configuration in SXP but does not create the domain

(-) -c, --console_autoconnect

Connect to the console after the domain is created

(-) -q, --quiet

Quiet mode

(-) -p, --paused

Leave the domain paused after it is created

Table C.10: xl create Added Options

create Added Options

Options

Task

(+) -V, --vncviewer

Attach to domain's VNC server, forking a vncviewer process

(+) -A, --vncviewer-autopass

Pass VNC password to vncviewer via stdin

C.3.5.2 console

xl console OPTIONS DOMAIN

Note
Note: libvirt Equivalent

virsh console

Table C.11: xl console Added Options

console Added Option

Option

Task

(+) -t [pv|serial]

Connect to a PV console or connect to an emulated serial console. PV consoles are the only consoles available for PV domains while HVM domains can have both

C.3.5.3 info

xl info

Table C.12: xm info Removed Options

info Removed Options

Options

Task

(-) -n, --numa

Numa info

(-) -c, --config

List Xend configuration parameters

C.3.5.4 dump-core

xl dump-core DOMAIN FILENAME

Note
Note: libvirt Equivalent

virsh dump

Table C.13: xm dump-core Removed Options

dump-core Removed Options

Options

Task

(-) -L, --live

Dump core without pausing the domain

(-) -C, --crash

Crash domain after dumping core

(-) -R, --reset

Reset domain after dumping core

C.3.5.5 list

xl list options DOMAIN

Note
Note: libvirt Equivalent

virsh list --all

Table C.14: xm list Removed Options

list Removed Options

Options

Task

(-) -l, --long

The output for xm list presents the data in SXP format

(-) --state==STATE

Output information for VMs in the specified state

Table C.15: xl list Added Options

list Added Options

Options

Task

(+) -Z, --context

Also prints the security labels

(+) -v, --verbose

Also prints the domain UUIDs, the shutdown reason and security labels

C.3.5.6 mem-*

Note
Note: libvirt Equivalent

virsh setmem

virsh setmaxmem

Table C.16: xl mem-* Changed Options

mem-* Changed Options

Options

Task

mem-max DOMAIN_ID MEM

Appending t for terabytes, g for gigabytes, m for megabytes,k for kilobytes and b for bytes. Specify the maximum amount of memory the domain can use.

mem-set DOMAIN_ID MEM

Set the domain's used memory using the balloon driver

C.3.5.7 migrate

xl migrate OPTIONS DOMAIN HOST

Note
Note: libvirt Equivalent

virsh migrate --live hvm-sles11-qcow2 xen+ CONNECTOR://USER@IP_ADDRESS/

Table C.17: xm migrate Removed Options

migrate Removed Options

Options

Task

(-) -l, --live

Use live migration. This will migrate the domain between hosts without shutting down the domain

(-) -r, --resource Mbs

Set maximum Mbs allowed for migrating the domain

(-) -c, --change_home_server

Change home server for managed domains

(-) --max_iters=MAX_ITERS

Number of iterations before final suspend (default:30)

(-) --max_factor=MAX_FACTOR

Max amount of memory to transfer before final suspend (default: 3*RAM).

(-) --min_remaining=MIN_REMAINING

Number of dirty pages before final suspend (default:50)

(-) --abort_if_busy

Abort migration instead of doing final suspend

(-) --log_progress

Log progress of migration to xend.log

(-) -s, --ssl

Use ssl connection for migration

Table C.18: xl migrate Added Options

migrate Added Options

Options

Task

(+) -s SSHCOMMAND

Use <sshcommand> instead of ssh

(+) -e

On the new host, do not wait in the background (on <host>) for the death of the domain

(+) -C CONFIG

Send <config> instead of the configuration file used when creating the domain

C.3.5.8 Domain Management

xl reboot OPTIONS DOMAIN

Note
Note: libvirt Equivalent

virsh reboot

Table C.19: xm reboot Removed Options

reboot Removed Options

Options

Task

(-) -a, --all

Reboot all domains

(-) -w, --wait

Wait for reboot to complete before returning. This may take a while, as all services in the domain need to be shut down cleanly

Table C.20: xl reboot Added Options

reboot Added Options

Option

Task

(+) -F

Fallback to ACPI reset event for HVM guests with no PV drivers

xl save OPTIONS DOMAIN CHECK_POINT_FILE CONFIG_FILE

Note
Note: libvirt Equivalent

virsh save

Table C.21: xl save Added Options

save Added Options

Option

Task

(+) -c

Leave domain running after creating the snapshot

xl restore OPTIONS CONFIG_FILE CHECK_POINT_FILE

Note
Note: libvirt Equivalent

virsh restore

Table C.22: xl restore Added Options

restore Added Options

Options

Task

(+) -p

Do not unpause domain after restoring it

(+) -e

Do not wait in the background for the death of the domain on the new host

(+) -d

Enable debug messages

(+) -V, --vncviewer

Attach to domain's VNC server, forking a vncviewer process

(+) -A, --vncviewer-autopass

Pass VNC password to vncviewer via stdin

xl shutdown OPTIONS DOMAIN

Note
Note: libvirt Equivalent

virsh shutdown

Table C.23: xm shutdown Removed Options

shutdown Removed Options

Options

Task

(-) -w, --wait

Wait for the domain to complete shutdown before returning

(-) -a

Shutdown all guest domains

(-) -R

(-) -H

Table C.24: xl shutdown Added Options

shutdown Added Options

Option

Task

(+) -F

If the guest does not support PV shutdown control then fallback to sending an ACPI power event

Table C.25: xl trigger Changed Options

trigger Changed Options

Option

Task

trigger DOMAIN <nmi|reset|init|power|sleep|s3resume> VCPU

Send a trigger to a domain. Only available for HVM domains

C.3.5.9 xl sched-*

xl sched-credit OPTIONS

Note
Note: libvirt Equivalent

virsh schedinfo

Table C.26: xm sched-credit Removed Options

sched-credit Removed Options

Options

Task

-d DOMAIN, --domain=DOMAIN

Domain

-w WEIGHT, --weight=WEIGHT

A domain with a weight of 512 will get twice as much CPU as a domain with a weight of 256 on a contended host. Legal weights range from 1 to 65535 and the default is 256

-c CAP, --cap=CAP

The CAP optionally fixes the maximum amount of CPU a domain can consume

Table C.27: xl sched-credit Added Options

sched-credit Added Options

Options

Task

(+) -p CPUPOOL, --cpupool=CPUPOOL

Restrict output to domains in the specified cpupool

(+) -s, --schedparam

Specify to list or set pool-wide scheduler parameters

(+) -t TSLICE, --tslice_ms=TSLICE

Timeslice tells the scheduler how long to allow VMs to run before pre-empting

(+) -r RLIMIT, --ratelimit_us=RLIMIT

Ratelimit attempts to limit the number of schedules per second

xl sched-credit2 OPTIONS

Note
Note: libvirt Status

virsh only supports credit scheduler, not credit2 scheduler

Table C.28: xm sched-credit2 Removed Options

sched-credit2 Removed Options

Options

Task

-d DOMAIN, --domain=DOMAIN

Domain

-w WEIGHT, --weight=WEIGHT

Legal weights range from 1 to 65535 and the default is 256

Table C.29: xl sched-credit2 Added Options

sched-credit2 Added Options

Option

Task

(+) -p CPUPOOL, --cpupool=CPUPOOL

Restrict output to domains in the specified cpupool

xl sched-sedf OPTIONS

Table C.30: xm sched-sedf Removed Options

sched-sedf Removed Options

Options

Task

-p PERIOD, --period=PERIOD

The normal EDF scheduling usage in milliseconds

-s SLICE, --slice=SLICE

The normal EDF scheduling usage in milliseconds

-l LATENCY, --latency=LATENCY

Scaled period if domain is doing heavy I/O

-e EXTRA, --extra=EXTRA

Flag for allowing domain to run in extra time (0 or 1)

-w WEIGHT, --weight=WEIGHT

Another way of setting CPU slice

Table C.31: xl sched-sedf Added Options

sched-sedf Added Options

Options

Task

(+) -c CPUPOOL, --cpupool=CPUPOOL

Restrict output to domains in the specified cpupool

(+) -d DOMAIN, --domain=DOMAIN

Domain

C.3.5.10 xl cpupool-*

xl cpupool-cpu-remove CPU_POOL <CPU nr>|node:<node nr>

xl cpupool-list [-c|--cpus] CPU_POOL

Table C.32: xm cpupool-list Removed Options

cpupool-* Removed Options

Option

Task

(-) -l, --long

Output all CPU pool details in SXP format

xl cpupool-cpu-add CPU_POOL cpu-nr|node:node-nr

xl cpupool-create OPTIONS CONFIG_FILE [Variable=Value ...]

Table C.33: xm cpupool-create Removed Options

cpupool-create Removed Options

Options

Task

(-) -f FILE, --defconfig=FILE

Use the given Python configuration script. The configuration script is loaded after arguments have been processed

(-) -n, --dryrun

Dry run - prints the resulting configuration in SXP but does not create the CPU pool

(-) --help_config

Print the available configuration variables (vars) for the configuration script

(-) --path=PATH

Search path for configuration scripts. The value of PATH is a colon-separated directory list

(-) -F=FILE, --config=FILE

CPU pool configuration to use (SXP)

C.3.5.11 PCI and Block Devices

xl pci-detach [-f] DOMAIN_ID <BDF>

Note
Note: libvirt Equivalent

virsh detach-device

Table C.34: xl pci-detach Added Options

pci-detach Added Options

Option

Task

(+) -f

If -f is specified, xl is going to forcefully remove the device even without guest's collaboration

Table C.35: xm block-list Removed Options

block-list Removed Options

Option

Task

(-) -l, --long

List virtual block devices for a domain

Table C.36: Other Options

Option

libvirt equivalent

xl block-attach DOMAIN <disk-spec-component(s)>

virsh attach-disk/attach-device

xl block-list DOMAIN_ID

virsh domblklist

C.3.5.12 Network

Table C.37: Network Options

Option

libvirt equivalent

xl network-list DOMAIN(s)

virsh domiflist

xl network-detach DOMAIN_ID devid|mac

virsh detach-interface

xl network-attach DOMAIN(s)

virsh attach-interface/attach-device

Table C.38: xl network-attach Removed Options

Removed Options

Option

Task

(-) -l, --long

C.3.6 New Options

Table C.39: New Options

Options

Task

config-update DOMAIN CONFIG_FILE OPTIONS VARS

Update the saved configuration for a running domain. This has no immediate effect but will be applied when the guest is next restarted. This command is useful to ensure that runtime modifications made to the guest will be preserved when the guest is restarted

migrate-receive

sharing DOMAIN

List count of shared pages.List specifically for that domain. Otherwise, list for all domains

vm-list

Prints information about guests. This list excludes information about service or auxiliary domains such as Dom0 and stubdoms

cpupool-rename CPU_POOL NEWNAME

Renames a cpu-pool to newname

cpupool-numa-split

Splits up the machine into one cpu-pool per numa node

cd-insert DOMAIN <VirtualDevice> <type:path>

Insert a CD-ROM into a guest domain's existing virtual CD drive. The virtual drive must already exist but can be current empty

cd-eject DOMAIN <VirtualDevice>

Eject a CD-ROM from a guest's virtual CD drive. Only works with HVM domains

pci-assignable-list

List all the assignable PCI devices. These are devices in the system which are configured to be available for pass-through and are bound to a suitable PCI back-end driver in Dom0 rather than a real driver

pci-assignable-add <BDF>

Make the device at PCI Bus/Device/Function BDF assignable to guests.This will bind the device to the pciback driver

pci-assignable-remove OPTIONS <BDF>

Make the device at PCI Bus/Device/Function BDF assignable to guests. This will at least unbind the device from pciback

loadpolicy POLICY_FILE

Load FLASK policy from the given policy file. The initial policy is provided to the hypervisor as a multiboot module; this command allows runtime updates to the policy. Loading new security policy will reset runtime changes to device labels

C.5 Saving a Xen Guest Configuration in an xm Compatible Format

Although xl is now the current toolkit for managing Xen guests (apart from the preferred libvirt), you may need to export the guest configuration to the previously used xm format. To do this, follow these steps:

  1. First export the guest configuration to a file:

    > virsh dumpxml guest_id > guest_cfg.xml
  2. Then convert the configuration to the xm format:

    > virsh domxml-to-native xen-xm guest_cfg.xml > guest_xm_cfg