[libvirt-users] unable to edit existing snapshot

[noxdafox]

On 30/04/15 17:49, Eric Blake wrote:
> On 04/30/2015 12:28 AM, NoxDaFox wrote:
>> Sorry for the lack of information, my bad.
>>
> Also, we tend to avoid top-posting on technical lists.
Sorry again.
>
>> The snapshot is an internal one and the machine is running.
>>
>> The whole thing was set-up by another person and left to me to cope with.
>> The typo is mine, as the machine is isolated I cannot actually copy-paste
>> it so have to do it in the traditional way.
> I know the feeling :)
>
>> I am aware of the issue which come when changing HW but I couldn't do
>> otherwise.
>>
>> I am only interested in reverting the disk's state. I guess qemu-img can
>> deal with it that but can libvirt as well?
> qemu-img can be used to extract the internal snapshot disk state into a
> standalone file.  The problem is that reverting to an internal snapshot
> is only possible if you provide a qemu command line compatible with when
> the snapshot was taken, but qemu doesn't store that information itself.
>   So it is up to libvirt to store the information, but libvirt refuses to
> allow changes to a snapshot where the guest ABI would be different, at
> least if the snapshot was tied to a running guest state.
I eventually extracted the state in a standalone file. As said, I just 
needed to revert the disk state.
A newly created machine with compatible CPU was created and everything 
went smooth. I was expecting the guest OS to complain (Windows asking to 
register the key again) but luckily it seemed it liked the CPU.
>
>> What puzzled me was the error output which is kinda misleading.
> Yeah, I'm not sure why you got that particular error, but I'm worried
> that what you are trying to do won't work through libvirt API, so you'll
> end up having to do a backdoor approach anyways in order to revert to
> the state but with a different guest hardware description.
Point was the misleading sentence "<snapshot_name> already exist" which 
is kinda funny as it's hard to edit a non existing one.
>
>> Is it so that libvirt prevents editing snapshot configuration when running?
> No, libvirt should allow snapshot edits regardless of current state and
> regardless of the state captured in the snapshot, but only as long as
> the edits don't change the guest ABI.
>
>> Is it due to the fact that the snapshots are internal?
> You'd get the same restrictions on editing machine ABI on external
> snapshots.  It's just that external snapshots are a bit easier to
> forcefully revert to by editing <domain> xml, rather than trying to
> change the snapshot in place.
Clear.
>
> It may also be possible to capture the snapshot xml (virsh
> snapshot-dumpxml $dom $name > $file'), then have libvirt forget about it
> ('virsh snapshot-delete --metadata $dom $name'), then edit the xml and
> redefine the snapshot ('virsh snapshot-create --redefine $dom $file'),
> where the redefined domain is not strictly ABI compatible, but where
> libvirt no longer has the information on hand to reject the redefinition
> as invalid.
Didn't try this one as it sounded scary.

Anyway, I manage to solve my issue. Thank you very much!