Re: [PATCH] KVM: Add wrapper script around QEMU to test kernels

Avi Kivity
2011-11-06T10:24:39Z

On 11/06/2011 12:12 PM, Pekka Enberg wrote:
> On Sun, Nov 6, 2011 at 12:07 PM, Avi Kivity <avi@redhat.com> wrote:
> >> I'm happy to see some real competition for the KVM tool in usability. ;-)
> >>
> >> That said, while the script looks really useful for developers,
> >> wouldn't it make more sense to put it in QEMU to make sure it's kept
> >> up-to-date and distributions can pick it up too? (And yes, I realize
> >> the irony here.)
> >
> > Why would distributions want it? It's only useful for kernel developers.
>
> It's useful for kernel testers too.

Well, they usually have a kernel with them.

> If this is a serious attempt in making QEMU command line suck less on
> Linux, I think it makes sense to do this properly instead of adding a
> niche script to the kernel tree that's simply going to bit rot over
> time.

You misunderstand. This is an attempt to address the requirements of a
niche population, kernel developers and testers, not to improve the qemu
command line. For the majority of qemu installations, this script is
useless.

In most installations, qemu is driven by other programs, so any changes
to the command line would be invisible, except insofar as they break things.

For the occasional direct user of qemu, something like 'qemu-kvm -m 1G
/images/blah.img' is enough to boot an image. This script doesn't help
in any way.

This script is for kernel developers who don't want to bother with
setting up a disk image (which, btw, many are still required to do - I'm
guessing most kernel developers who use qemu are cross-arch). It has
limited scope and works mostly by hiding qemu features. As such it
doesn't belong in qemu.

--
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