Groups | Search | Server Info | Keyboard shortcuts | Login | Register [http] [https] [nntp] [nntps]

Groups > linux.debian.user > #262771

Re: Which Virtual Manager? Was: EASY way to install packages from trixie/sid to stable?

Show all headers | View raw

[Multipart message — attachments visible in raw view] - view raw

On 2023-10-26 at 15:28, Andrew M.A. Cater wrote:

> Apt-get install virt-manager will pull in all the associated
> qemu/KVM packages you might need. It should be at least as
> straightforward to use as Virtualbox.

I've seen people state or suggest multiple times that virt-manager
should be, as you say, as straightforward to use as VirtualBox, and that
was what I expected to find when I tried to use it myself - but even
once I got around the issues that arose from my not using systemd et
cetera and could actually use the program, it is not what I actually found.

(I very much hope that what I am about to describe is wrong, and that
people will explain how/why it's wrong, such that I can get out of the
situation described and into a state where I can actually use
virt-manager in a way that I could find useful. It is not my intention
to spread FUD or falsehoods, even if some of the below may look like it
would fall within those categories.)


From what I recall from having used VirtualBox in the past, its workflow
is fairly similar to what I see in using VMWare Workstation in a
(work-related) Windows environment. When you create a new VM, it prompts
you for where the VM's files should be stored, and then for details
about the VM's configuration (disk sizes, hardware devices, et cetera),
and optionally lets you specify what will be done to install the OS that
will run in the VM - and then with that done, the VM is ready, and you
can boot it up or create a snapshot (using a graphical
snapshot-management interface) or make further configuration edits or do
whatever else you will with it.

With virt-manager, from what I recall (it has been a while since I last
tried), the workflow was quite different. IIRC, I didn't even try using
qemu as a backend, because AFAIK it doesn't support hierarchical VM
snapshots and that's a feature I very much expect to rely on; instead I
think I went with KVM. With that backend, AFAIR I didn't even get
prompted for where the VM's file should be stored; instead, the location
where the system stores files appears to be defined in a system-wide
config file, and to not be modifiable on a per-VM basis (except relative
to that system-wide root). That's a problem, because when I partitioned
this system I expected to be able to store VM files in the same massive
data partition as I allocated for other large data; the default
system-wide location doesn't have the space to do much with. It also
doesn't work when the system may have multiple users who may want to
manage VMs separately from one another (though, fortunately, this is
more an abstract concern rather than one that affects me in practice).

With VMWare Workstation and what I think I I recall from VirtualBox,
once a VM is created, the resulting files are owned by the user who ran
the program. With what I recall from when I tried virt-manager, even if
I redirected the file storage location to be under the larger data
partition, the files were owned by another user, related to libvirt.
That's undesirable when trying to store VM files per-user in a per-user
location, since the user won't be able to work with them (moving them
around, editing details, etc.) except through programs running with that
other user's access.

When I accepted that and tried to proceed anyway, for the sake of
experimentation, IIRC, I ran into obstacles trying to set up the
necessary virtual hardware for the VM - in particular, IIRC, a virtual
CD drive pointed at the ISO that would be used to install the OS. (This
part I am less certain about than even the above; it's been rather a
while, and I was stressed enough by the time I hit this point that I may
have blanked out more of the details in self-defense.) At that point, I
gave up, at least in part for the sake of not piling more and more
stress on myself trying to get the ability to do things that would
hopefully enable me to reduce stress in other areas.

(Writing this mail is already bringing back up all that stress, and I
hope it will not just wind up making things worse.)


So... either I somehow have managed to do things *100% completely
wrong*, or the workflow with virt-manager is not even remotely as
straightforward(ly usable) as the one I see with VMWare Workstation and
think I remember seeing with VirtualBox.

I would *love* to be wrong about that, because there is a *lot* of stuff
that I'd like to do that would be *far* easier if I had discardable VM
snapshots to do it in. However, I also do not have the personal stress
to spare for experimenting with this blindly and bashing my head against
walls getting nowhere in those experiments.

If there *is* a way to get virt-manager to support a VMWare( and, I
think, VirtualBox)-like workflow - with support for hierarchical nested
snapshots, and graphical management thereof, among other things - and
have things more-or-less Just Work, I would *love* to learn about it.

-- 
   The Wanderer

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one
persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all
progress depends on the unreasonable man.         -- George Bernard Shaw

Back to linux.debian.user | Previous | Next — Previous in thread | Next in thread | Find similar | Unroll thread

Thread

EASY way to install packages from trixie/sid to stable? Hans <hans.ullrich@loop.de> - 2023-10-26 17:40 +0200
  Re: EASY way to install packages from trixie/sid to stable? "Alexander V. Makartsev" <avbetev@gmail.com> - 2023-10-26 18:40 +0200
    Re: EASY way to install packages from trixie/sid to stable? Michael Kjörling <2695bd53d63c@ewoof.net> - 2023-10-26 19:10 +0200
        Which Virtual Manager? Was: EASY way to install packages from trixie/sid to  stable? Hans <hans.ullrich@loop.de> - 2023-10-26 19:30 +0200
        Re: Which Virtual Manager? Michael Kjörling <2695bd53d63c@ewoof.net> - 2023-10-26 19:50 +0200
          Re: Which Virtual Manager? Hans <hans.ullrich@loop.de> - 2023-10-26 20:10 +0200
        Re: Which Virtual Manager? Was: EASY way to install packages from  trixie/sid to stable? Jeffrey Walton <noloader@gmail.com> - 2023-10-26 21:20 +0200
          Re: Which Virtual Manager? Was: EASY way to install packages from  trixie/sid to stable? "Andrew M.A. Cater" <amacater@einval.com> - 2023-10-26 21:30 +0200
            Re: Which Virtual Manager? Was: EASY way to install packages from  trixie/sid to stable? The Wanderer <wanderer@fastmail.fm> - 2023-10-27 11:20 +0200
              Re: Which Virtual Manager? Was: EASY way to install packages from  trixie/sid to stable? "Andrew M.A. Cater" <amacater@einval.com> - 2023-10-27 19:40 +0200
              Re: Which Virtual Manager? Was: EASY way to install packages from  trixie/sid to stable? The Wanderer <wanderer@fastmail.fm> - 2023-10-27 21:10 +0200
                Re: Which Virtual Manager? Was: EASY way to install packages from  trixie/sid to stable? Max Nikulin <manikulin@gmail.com> - 2023-10-28 06:30 +0200
                Re: Which Virtual Manager? Was: EASY way to install packages from  trixie/sid to stable? The Wanderer <wanderer@fastmail.fm> - 2023-10-28 12:40 +0200
                Re: Which Virtual Manager? Michael Kjörling <2695bd53d63c@ewoof.net> - 2023-10-28 14:20 +0200
              Re: Which Virtual Manager? Was: EASY way to install packages from  trixie/sid to stable? Charles Curley <charlescurley@charlescurley.com> - 2023-10-27 22:20 +0200
  Re: EASY way to install packages from trixie/sid to stable? <tomas@tuxteam.de> - 2023-10-26 18:40 +0200
  Re: EASY way to install packages from trixie/sid to stable? exceptbees <exceptbees@proton.me> - 2023-10-26 19:30 +0200
  Re: EASY way to install packages from trixie/sid to stable? Peter Hillier-Brook <phb@hbsys.plus.com> - 2023-10-26 21:50 +0200

csiph-web