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Subject: Re: [kvm-devel] [Qemu-devel] Re: Storing command line options in
	images
From: Anthony Liguori <anthony@codemonkey.ws>
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Date: Mon, 13 Aug 2007 22:17:09 -0500
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To: Thiemo Seufer <ths@networkno.de>
Cc: kvm-devel@lists.sourceforge.net, Jorge =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Luc=E1ngeli?= Obes <t4m5yn@gmail.com>, qemu-devel@nongnu.org


On Mon, 2007-08-13 at 20:39 +0100, Thiemo Seufer wrote:
> Jorge Lucángeli Obes wrote:
> [snip]
> > When I read Avi's TODO, I basically thought about getting rid of the
> > long command lines I had to store in scripts. I wanted to write that
> > command line once, and then forgetting about it, until I needed to
> > change it.
> 
> Instead of inventing great and wonderfully complicated schemes, the
> most sensible way I can think of is to recycle a feature which is now
> implemented in the GNU toolchain, and apparently stems from Windows:
> 
>   qemu @qemu.cfg
> 
> where qemu.cfg is a file which contains the command line arguments.
> (This is also low-maintenance, as it allows to re-use the existing
> parser. No need for duplicated logic.)

In this case, it's also just as easy to make a shell script.  I think an
important goal here is to automatically associate the options for a VM
with the actual disk image.  It's not just about storing said options in
a file.

Regards,

Anthony Liguori

> > I wanted an image to be self-contained as much as possible.
> > That's what I set to achieve.
> 
> Which tends to collect all the complexity in a single piece.
> That seems to be the common problem of the option discussed here.
> 
> > All that said, I rethought Anthony's idea of storing plain text in the
> > image and with proper tools, it can work out.
> 
> Requiring "proper tools" doesn't leave much of a point for plain text.
> 
> 
> Thiemo