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Subject: Re: [Qemu-devel] Re: [kvm-devel] [PATCH] Add support for
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Date: Wed, 14 May 2008 17:52:56 +0300
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Cc: kvm-devel@lists.sourceforge.net, Anthony Liguori <aliguori@us.ibm.com>, Paul Brook <paul@codesourcery.com>


On Wed, 2008-05-14 at 17:41 +0300, Avi Kivity wrote:
> Daniel P. Berrange wrote:
> > That's very nearly YAML format[1], which is attractive because parsers
> > are available in every major programming language, and it is still
> > pretty human friendly.
> >
> > So my preference would be to go with the last option and make sure
> > it really is YAML compliant so people can use standard tools for 
> > generating and parsing the format.
> >   
> 
> Using a standard format has the added benefit that things like quoting 
> are taken care of.
> 
> Filenames with leading and trailing spaces, anyone?  Embedded control 
> characters?
> 

Please don't jump over me but I think it is worth mentioning OVF, at
least for to know what's you opinions.

Open Virtualization Format -
http://www.vmware.com/appliances/learn/ovf.html

It's xml based, supported by all major hypervisors, so qemu/kvm/xen
users might eventually use a product that support OVF.
Since its a new format it is open for changes and has lots of
flexibility. As a start we don't have to be completely compatible with
it.
It supports definition cpus, startup options, various devices (nic, ide,
scsi,...). For example:
"
<Item>
  <rasd:Caption>Ethernet adapter on "VM Network"</rasd:Caption>
  <rasd:InstanceId>4000</rasd:InstanceId>
  <rasd:ResourceType>10</rasd:ResourceType>
  <rasd:ResourceSubType>VmxNet, E1000</rasd:ResourceSubType>
  <rasd:AutomaticAllocation>true</rasd:AutomaticAllocation>
  <rasd:Connection>VM Network</rasd:Connection>
</Item>
<Item>
  <rasd:Caption>SCSI Controller 0</rasd:Caption>
  <rasd:InstanceId>1000</rasd:InstanceId>
  <rasd:ResourceType>6</rasd:ResourceType>
  <rasd:ResourceSubType>LsiLogic, BusLogic</rasd:ResourceSubType>
</Item>
<Item>
  <rasd:Caption>Harddisk 1</rasd:Caption>
  <rasd:InstanceId>22001</rasd:InstanceId>
  <rasd:ResourceType>17</rasd:ResourceType>
  <rasd:HostResource>disk/vmdisk1</rasd:HostResource>
  <rasd:Parent>1000</rasd:Parent>
</Item>
<Item>
</Item>
"

One can claim to xml is bad and ovf is outside of the scope and if one
wants ovf, mgmt tool can wrap it around qemu. Nevertheless why doubling
the effort? Qemu can reuse it and its mgmt tools.