Re: [Qemu-devel] Re: [PATCH] Split machine creation from the main loop

[Avi Kivity <avi@redhat.com>]

On 02/24/2011 01:12 AM, Anthony Liguori wrote:
>> What is the plan from here?
>
>
> 1) Decouple QMP from qemu_machine_init().  This really requires the 
> introduction of the new QAPI server that exists outside of the chardev 
> infrastructure since chardevs are currently initialized in 
> qemu_machine_init().

Is it really necessary?  What's blocking us from initializing chardevs 
early?

It would be a pity to divorce the monitor from chardevs, they're really 
flexible.


> 2) Make qemu_machine_init() take no parameters and just reference 
> global state.
>
> 3) Teach all QMP functions to behave themselves if called before 
> qemu_machine_init()
>
> 4) Introduce QMP function to call qemu_machine_init()

An alternative is to remove all guest-visible content from 
qemu_machine_init().  So machine->init() would take no parameters and 
only build the static devices (power supply?).  Everything else would be 
hot-plugged (perhaps some would fail if the machine was started - 
cold-plug only).

>
> 5) Introduce new command line flag to not automatically call 
> qemu_machine_init()
>
> 6) Convert all command line options to just be QMP function calls
>
> (6) can be started right now.  (1) comes with the QAPI merge.  (2) is 
> pretty easy to do after applying this patch.  (3) is probably 
> something that can be done shortly after (1).  (4) and (5) really 
> require everything but (6) to be in place before we can meaningful do it.
>
> I think we can lay out much of the ground work for this in 0.15 and I 
> think we can have a total conversion realistically for 0.16.  That 
> means that by EOY, we could invoke QEMU with no options and do 
> everything through QMP.

It's something that I've agitated for a long while, but when I see all 
the work needed, I'm not sure it's cost effective.

-- 
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