[et-mgmt-tools] VMware/qemu-kvm-?? migration
Gene Czarcinski
gene at czarc.net
Wed Jul 15 12:53:32 UTC 2009
On Wednesday 15 July 2009 03:50:32 Richard W.M. Jones wrote:
> On Tue, Jul 14, 2009 at 05:39:45PM -0400, Gene Czarcinski wrote:
> > Is this the mailing list to ask about issues/problems migrating VMware
> > guests to run on qemu-kvm, etc.?
> >
> > If not, please point me to an appropriate mailing list?
>
> Yes this is good.
>
> I've actually been playing with manual migration of guests from VMWare
> recently. This is what I do:
>
> (1) Export the guest in OVF format (File -> Export -> Export OVF Template)
>
> (2) Convert the *.vmdk file (disk image) into a raw file:
>
> qemu-img convert -f vmdk -O raw *.vmdk image.raw
>
> (3) Boot the raw image using libvirt. I create a libvirt
> configuration by hand, but IIRC there is now a tool which does this
> automatically.
Thanks ... I am going to give the above a try.
Before I go too far down this path only to discover that it still will not
work for me, here is some of what I have done (everything was done on a Fedora
11 host with preview updates installed and the host processor is an AMD Phenom
II 940):
1. I have created (under qemu-kvm) a simple F11 guest on a SCSI adapter (qcow2
format) (I had to do some dancing to use the SCSI adapter) .. this
installs/runs fine.
2. I then created (under qemu-kvm) a simple F11 guest with an IDE adapter for
the disk image. Before booting, I replaced the disk image with a copy of the
disk image from the SCSI install (1) ... this also runs fine ... qemu-kvm does
not seem to care about the image that much if it was created under qemu-kvm.
3. I created a simple (no LVM) F11 guest with IDE interface under VMware
Workstation 6.5.2 where I specified "Workstation 4" comparability so the the
vmdk file was HWversion=3. Under qemu-kvm, I created a simple guest with IDE
for the disk interface and used the vmdk file I created under VMware ... this
booted up and ran fine!
Now the problem:
4. Under qemu-kvm I created a simple Fedora guest definition. I then copied
and used a VMware F9 guest with a vmdk file which is HWversion=4 and was
created under VMware on a SCSI interface disk. To make matters even worse,
this VMware guest uses the "root" (/) partition on a LVM logical volume. Boot
the guest up on qemu-kvm and it immediately crashes because it cannot find
"root" or see the logical volumes.
5. I booted up the F9 distribution DVD in rescue mode and the above vmdk disk
attached ... the disk was "visible" and I could chroot into it.
6. I examined the disks with guestfish and that worked too.
Should this stuff work? What am I missing?
BTW, attempting to boot a vmdk disk which is other than HWversion=3, results
in the same problem although qemu-kvm, etc. does not give any error.
BTW, I have used guestfish with various vmdk files and handles them all even if
they are other than HWversion=3 or HWversion=4.
Gene
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