Re: [Xen-tools] Re: [PATCH] Make xend reject duplicates and rename zombies

[Christian Limpach <christian.limpach@gmail.com>]

On 9/15/05, Anthony Liguori <aliguori@us.ibm.com> wrote:
> I think this is not the right solution to the problem at hand.  The
> problem stems from the fact that xm destroy is just a call to
> xc_domain_destroy which is really just a request to the hypervisor to
> destroy the domain.

Indeed.

> Therefore, there is a race condition if you assume that the domain is
> dead after xm destroy returns.  This patch renames the domain name which
> prevents a name class but does not solve the general problem.  Consider,
> for instance, if a domain is using a block device and you do an xm
> destroy.  It is not safe to create a new domain with that same block
> device until you know that the previously mentioned domain is gone.

I think renaming would make sense if a domain is crashed.  You might
want to keep the domain around to attach a debugger to it but at the
same time restart a fresh copy as soon as possible.

> This patch would allow:
> xm destroy xmexample1 && xm create /etc/xen/xmexample1
> 
> I think the right solution is to make xm destroy not return until the
> domain has actually gone away and add a flag to xm destroy to return
> immediately if that behavior is ever desired.

Sounds good.

> I'll work up a patch tonight after class.

Thanks!

     christian