Basic KVM on CentOS 5

Fri 24 Oct 2008

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I've been using kvm for my virtualisation needs lately, instead of xen, and finding it great. Disadvantages are that it requires hardware virtualisation support, and so only works on newer Intel/AMD CPUs. Advantages are that it's baked into recent linux kernels, and so more or less Just Works out of the box, no magic kernels required.

There are some pretty useful resources covering this stuff out on the web - the following sites are particularly useful:

There's not too much specific to CentOS though, so here's the recipe I've been using for CentOS 5:

# Confirm your CPU has virtualisation support
egrep 'vmx|svm' /proc/cpuinfo

# Install the kvm and qemu packages you need
# From the CentOS Extras repository (older):
yum install --enablerepo=extras kvm kmod-kvm qemu
# OR from my repository (for most recent kernels only):
ARCH=$(uname -i)
OF_MREPO=http://www.openfusion.com.au/mrepo/centos5-$ARCH/RPMS.of/
rpm -Uvh $OF_MREPO/openfusion-release-0.3-1.of.noarch.rpm
yum install kvm kmod-kvm qemu

# Install the appropriate kernel module - either:
modprobe kvm-intel
# OR:
modprobe kvm-amd
lsmod | grep kvm

# Check the kvm device exists
ls -l /dev/kvm

# I like to run my virtual machines as a 'kvm' user, not as root
chgrp kvm /dev/kvm
chmod 660 /dev/kvm
ls -l /dev/kvm
useradd -r -g kvm kvm

# Create a disk image to use
cd /data/images
IMAGE=centos5x.img
# Note that the specified size is a maximum - the image only uses what it needs
qemu-img create -f qcow2 $IMAGE 10G
chown kvm $IMAGE

# Boot an install ISO on your image and do the install
MEM=1024
ISO=/path/to/CentOS-5.2-x86_64-bin-DVD.iso
# ISO=/path/to/WinXP.iso
qemu-kvm -hda $IMAGE -m ${MEM:-512} -cdrom $ISO -boot d
# I usually just do a minimal install with std defaults and dhcp, and configure later

# After your install has completed restart without the -boot parameter
# This should have outgoing networking working, but pings don't work (!)
qemu-kvm -hda $IMAGE -m ${MEM:-512} &

That should be sufficient to get you up and running with basic outgoing networking (for instance as a test desktop instance). In qemu terms this is using 'user mode' networking which is easy but slow, so if you want better performance, or if you want to allow incoming connections (e.g. as a server) you need some extra magic, which I'll cover in a "subsequent post":kvm_bridging.

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Simple KVM Bridging

Fri 24 Oct 2008

Tags: , , ,

Following on from my post yesterday on "Basic KVM on CentOS 5", here's how to setup simple bridging to allow incoming network connections to your VM (and to get other standard network functionality like pings working). This is a simplified/tweaked version of Hadyn Solomon's bridging instructions.

Note this this is all done on your HOST machine, not your guest.

For CentOS:

# Install bridge-utils
yum install bridge-utils

# Add a bridge interface config file
vi /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-br0
# DHCP version
ONBOOT=yes
TYPE=Bridge
DEVICE=br0
BOOTPROTO=dhcp
# OR, static version
ONBOOT=yes
TYPE=Bridge
DEVICE=br0
BOOTPROTO=static
IPADDR=xx.xx.xx.xx
NETMASK=255.255.255.0

# Make your primary interface part of this bridge e.g.
vi /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0
# Add:
BRIDGE=br0
# Optional: comment out BOOTPROTO/IPADDR lines, since they're
# no longer being used (the br0 takes precedence)

# Add a script to connect your guest instance to the bridge on guest boot
vi /etc/qemu-ifup
#!/bin/bash
BRIDGE=$(/sbin/ip route list | awk '/^default / { print $NF }')
/sbin/ifconfig $1 0.0.0.0 up
/usr/sbin/brctl addif $BRIDGE $1
# END OF SCRIPT
# Silence a qemu warning by creating a noop qemu-ifdown script
vi /etc/qemu-ifdown
#!/bin/bash
# END OF SCRIPT
chmod +x /etc/qemu-if*

# Test - bridged networking uses a 'tap' networking device
NAME=c5-1
qemu-kvm -hda $NAME.img -name $NAME -m ${MEM:-512} -net nic -net tap &

Done. This should give you VMs that are full network members, able to be pinged and accessed just like a regular host. Bear in mind that this means you'll want to setup firewalls etc. if you're not in a controlled environment.

Notes:

  • If you want to run more than one VM on your LAN, you need to set the guest MAC address explicitly, since otherwise qemu uses a static default that will conflict with any other similar VM on the LAN. e.g. do something like:
# HOST_ID, identifying your host machine (2-digit hex)
HOST_ID=91
# INSTANCE, identifying the guest on this host (2-digit hex)
INSTANCE=01
# Startup, but with explicit macaddr
NAME=c5-1
qemu-kvm -hda $NAME.img -name $NAME -m ${MEM:-512} \
  -net nic,macaddr=00:16:3e:${HOST_ID}:${INSTANCE}:00 -net tap &
  • This doesn't use the paravirtual ('virtio') drivers that Hadyn mentions, as these aren't available until kernel 2.6.25, so they're not available to CentOS linux guests without a kernel upgrade.
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