[et-mgmt-tools] [PATCH] First-cut at livecd support in virt-manager

[Daniel P. Berrange]

On Wed, May 02, 2007 at 01:26:06PM +0100, Mark McLoughlin wrote:
> Hey,
> 	The attached patch demos how we might add livecd support to
> virt-manager using the virtinst patches I just posted.
> 
> 	The way I did in the patch isn't great, but the basic idea is that in
> order to boot a LiveCD you'd go through the create wizard as follows:
> 
>   - Intro - as normal
>   - Name - choose a name for the VM
>   - Type - choose LiveCD instead of fully-virt or paravirt

I'm wondering how this would look when we come to dealing with install
pre-built images. In that case the image may want to be either PV or
FV depending on how the user created it. So adding an option here would
not work too well.

Perhaps we should be asking for the type of install upfront, distro vs
lived, vs pre-built image. I've also been toying around with idea that
instead of asking PV vs  FV, we should just ask for the install location,
and then probe that location to figure out whether it has PV or FV
capabilities. 

eg 
   If given a URL  http://foo.example/dist/

     - Probe for images/vmlinux  -> Can do FV  with QEMU
     - Probe for images/boot.iso -> Can do FV with QEMU or Xen
     - Probe for images/xen/vmlinux -> Can do PV with Xen

  We could choose FV or PV for the user, or at least give them the
  options of what installs are available, based on the media this
  pointed to & the host capabilities.

  This would suggest a sequence

     - Intro
     - Name
     - Media
     - Choice of FV/PV options relevant to their media

It would be interesting to explore whether bsaed on Media we can figure
out a simpler way to ask the user whether the ISO was a distro installer
vs a LiveCD ?

>   - Location - choose the path of the LiveCD iso or device, choose
>     OS type or variant

I'm not clear why you introduced a 3rd fork for the install media page
when the widgets are identical to those on the FV page. It adds rather
alot more code for no obvious benefit ?

>   - Disks - default it to create no disks, but you can choose to create
>     a disk too
>   - Network/CPU/Finish - as normal


So anyway, interesting prototype - I think we need to play around with 
various ideas here..

Dan.
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