Feature request: VMS systems should respond to virsh shutdown and reboot commands from the KVM host
Posted: Tue May 09, 2023 6:52 pm
In my tests so far, it appears that VMS systems created under KVM do not respond to the virsh commands for shutdown or reboot. Having these options supported is quite handy for centralized management defined at the hypervisor level. Some operations are just easier to co-ordinate from the central point, particularly if multiple systems are involved.
Aside from making it easier to deal with maintenance events on the KVM host, some activates involving single systems are more easily dealt with from the KVM host. For example, I put together a set of scripts that allow me to quickly take a cold snapshot of a guest system with 100% certainty that all data is flushed to disk.It leverages LVM snapshots on the host, but it ensures complete integrity by first shutting down the guest before taking the snapshots. The true state of the guest is easily tracked on the KVM host to make certain the shutdown is complete before the snapshot is take. Once the snapshots are taken, the guest is quickly restarted (if it was up and running to begin with). All together, the guest is down for just a handful of seconds in this operation.
This is but one example where it is easier for the KVM host to understand the overall management state for operations requiring coordination of activities on the KVM host and the VMS guest.
Aside from making it easier to deal with maintenance events on the KVM host, some activates involving single systems are more easily dealt with from the KVM host. For example, I put together a set of scripts that allow me to quickly take a cold snapshot of a guest system with 100% certainty that all data is flushed to disk.It leverages LVM snapshots on the host, but it ensures complete integrity by first shutting down the guest before taking the snapshots. The true state of the guest is easily tracked on the KVM host to make certain the shutdown is complete before the snapshot is take. Once the snapshots are taken, the guest is quickly restarted (if it was up and running to begin with). All together, the guest is down for just a handful of seconds in this operation.
This is but one example where it is easier for the KVM host to understand the overall management state for operations requiring coordination of activities on the KVM host and the VMS guest.