problems with understanding of the memory parameters in the xml file

[Lentes, Bernd]

----- On Feb 12, 2020, at 8:34 AM, Peter Krempa pkrempa at redhat.com wrote:

> to briefly summarize what those three knobs do:
> 
> 1) memory - this is the initial memory size for a VM. qemu grants this
> amount of memory to the VM on start. This is also the memory the guest
> is able to use if the balloon driver is not loaded as the balloon driver
> voluntarily gives up memory from the guest OS to the host.
> 
> 2) currentmemory - in case the guest is using the balloon driver this is
> the actual memory size it's using. This field is dynamically updated to
> reflect the size reported by the balloon driver
> 
> 3) maxMemory - This knob controls the maximum size of the memory when
> memory hotplug is used. This basically sets the amount of address space
> and memory slots the VM has so that new memory can be plugged in later.

Aaaah.
 
> The above can also be added during runtime e.g. using virsh
> attach-device. Hence hotplug. It can also be unplugged during runtime
> but that requires guest cooperation and there are a few caveats of this.
> Namely to successfully unplug the memory the guest must not write any
> non-movable pages into it so that it can give up the memory later. On
> linux that means that no memory-mapped I/O regions can be created there
> which may lead to weird guest behaviour if the memory is onlined as
> movable. I'm not sure how windows behaves in this regard though, but
> AFAIK it supports memory hotplug just fine.
> 
>> What i find concerning ballooning is that it doesn't work automatically but has
>> to be adjusted
>> manually. Is that right ?
> 
> No, unfortunately none of this works automatically.
> 
>> Is my idea right, does that work basically ? If yes how do i have to set the
>> parameters ?
>> Is the memory released after the guest has e.g. finished his calculation ?
>> Does that work automatically or do i have to adjust that manually ?
> 
> When using the balloon driver you can set the 'currentMemory' size down
> to some reasonable value and the balloon driver will then return the
> memory to the host. There were some attempts to make this automatic, but
> I don't remember how they went. One other caveat is that any memory
> returned by the balloon driver to the host may be available to the guest
> again e.g. on reboot when the balloon driver is removed.
> 
> For a 1 NUMA node guest the memory hotplug an balloon can theoretically
> be combined but unplugging of the memory might not work while the ballon
> is inflated.
> 
> I hope this clarified it somehwat.

Yes it did.Thanks.
Ballon and Memeory hotplug are two different things, right ?
Which is better, where are the advantages and disadvantages ? 
I played a bit around with ballooning and it went like a charm.
If i try to use Hotplugging and inserts "maxMemory" and "memory model='dimm'" in the config,
libvirt complains i have to add a "numa" entry.
I don't know much about Numa, so maybe it's better not to use hotplugging.

While reading in the internet i stumbled across KSM for Linux, which is recommended for the host if you have
several guests of the same OS.
What do you think about it ? 

Btw: is it also possible to add cpu's to guests during runtime ?

Thanks.


Bernd
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