This is the very basic/initial version of virtio-mem. An introduction to
virtio-mem can be found in the Linux kernel driver [1]. While it can be
used in the current state for hotplug of a smaller amount of memory, it
will heavily benefit from resizeable memory regions in the future.
Each virtio-mem device manages a memory region (provided via a memory
backend). After requested by the hypervisor ("requested-size"), the
guest can try to plug/unplug blocks of memory within that region, in order
to reach the requested size. Initially, and after a reboot, all memory is
unplugged (except in special cases - reboot during postcopy).
The guest may only try to plug/unplug blocks of memory within the usable
region size. The usable region size is a little bigger than the
requested size, to give the device driver some flexibility. The usable
region size will only grow, except on reboots or when all memory is
requested to get unplugged. The guest can never plug more memory than
requested. Unplugged memory will get zapped/discarded, similar to in a
balloon device.
The block size is variable, however, it is always chosen in a way such that
THP splits are avoided (e.g., 2MB). The state of each block
(plugged/unplugged) is tracked in a bitmap.
As virtio-mem devices (e.g., virtio-mem-pci) will be memory devices, we now
expose "VirtioMEMDeviceInfo" via "query-memory-devices".
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
There are two important follow-up items that are in the works:
1. Resizeable memory regions: Use resizeable allocations/RAM blocks to
grow/shrink along with the usable region size. This avoids creating
initially very big VMAs, RAM blocks, and KVM slots.
2. Protection of unplugged memory: Make sure the gust cannot actually
make use of unplugged memory.
Other follow-up items that are in the works:
1. Exclude unplugged memory during migration (via precopy notifier).
2. Handle remapping of memory.
3. Support for other architectures.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Example usage (virtio-mem-pci is introduced in follow-up patches):
Start QEMU with two virtio-mem devices (one per NUMA node):
$ qemu-system-x86_64 -m 4G,maxmem=20G \
-smp sockets=2,cores=2 \
-numa node,nodeid=0,cpus=0-1 -numa node,nodeid=1,cpus=2-3 \
[...]
-object memory-backend-ram,id=mem0,size=8G \
-device virtio-mem-pci,id=vm0,memdev=mem0,node=0,requested-size=0M \
-object memory-backend-ram,id=mem1,size=8G \
-device virtio-mem-pci,id=vm1,memdev=mem1,node=1,requested-size=1G
Query the configuration:
(qemu) info memory-devices
Memory device [virtio-mem]: "vm0"
memaddr: 0x140000000
node: 0
requested-size: 0
size: 0
max-size: 8589934592
block-size: 2097152
memdev: /objects/mem0
Memory device [virtio-mem]: "vm1"
memaddr: 0x340000000
node: 1
requested-size: 1073741824
size: 1073741824
max-size: 8589934592
block-size: 2097152
memdev: /objects/mem1
Add some memory to node 0:
(qemu) qom-set vm0 requested-size 500M
Remove some memory from node 1:
(qemu) qom-set vm1 requested-size 200M
Query the configuration again:
(qemu) info memory-devices
Memory device [virtio-mem]: "vm0"
memaddr: 0x140000000
node: 0
requested-size: 524288000
size: 524288000
max-size: 8589934592
block-size: 2097152
memdev: /objects/mem0
Memory device [virtio-mem]: "vm1"
memaddr: 0x340000000
node: 1
requested-size: 209715200
size: 209715200
max-size: 8589934592
block-size: 2097152
memdev: /objects/mem1
[1] https://lkml.kernel.org/r/20200311171422.10484-1-david@redhat.com
Cc: "Michael S. Tsirkin" <mst@redhat.com>
Cc: Eric Blake <eblake@redhat.com>
Cc: Markus Armbruster <armbru@redhat.com>
Cc: "Dr. David Alan Gilbert" <dgilbert@redhat.com>
Cc: Igor Mammedov <imammedo@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: David Hildenbrand <david@redhat.com>
Message-Id: <20200626072248.78761-11-david@redhat.com>
Reviewed-by: Michael S. Tsirkin <mst@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Michael S. Tsirkin <mst@redhat.com>
===========
QEMU README
===========
QEMU is a generic and open source machine & userspace emulator and
virtualizer.
QEMU is capable of emulating a complete machine in software without any
need for hardware virtualization support. By using dynamic translation,
it achieves very good performance. QEMU can also integrate with the Xen
and KVM hypervisors to provide emulated hardware while allowing the
hypervisor to manage the CPU. With hypervisor support, QEMU can achieve
near native performance for CPUs. When QEMU emulates CPUs directly it is
capable of running operating systems made for one machine (e.g. an ARMv7
board) on a different machine (e.g. an x86_64 PC board).
QEMU is also capable of providing userspace API virtualization for Linux
and BSD kernel interfaces. This allows binaries compiled against one
architecture ABI (e.g. the Linux PPC64 ABI) to be run on a host using a
different architecture ABI (e.g. the Linux x86_64 ABI). This does not
involve any hardware emulation, simply CPU and syscall emulation.
QEMU aims to fit into a variety of use cases. It can be invoked directly
by users wishing to have full control over its behaviour and settings.
It also aims to facilitate integration into higher level management
layers, by providing a stable command line interface and monitor API.
It is commonly invoked indirectly via the libvirt library when using
open source applications such as oVirt, OpenStack and virt-manager.
QEMU as a whole is released under the GNU General Public License,
version 2. For full licensing details, consult the LICENSE file.
Building
========
QEMU is multi-platform software intended to be buildable on all modern
Linux platforms, OS-X, Win32 (via the Mingw64 toolchain) and a variety
of other UNIX targets. The simple steps to build QEMU are:
.. code-block:: shell
mkdir build
cd build
../configure
make
Additional information can also be found online via the QEMU website:
* `<https://qemu.org/Hosts/Linux>`_
* `<https://qemu.org/Hosts/Mac>`_
* `<https://qemu.org/Hosts/W32>`_
Submitting patches
==================
The QEMU source code is maintained under the GIT version control system.
.. code-block:: shell
git clone https://git.qemu.org/git/qemu.git
When submitting patches, one common approach is to use 'git
format-patch' and/or 'git send-email' to format & send the mail to the
qemu-devel@nongnu.org mailing list. All patches submitted must contain
a 'Signed-off-by' line from the author. Patches should follow the
guidelines set out in the CODING_STYLE.rst file.
Additional information on submitting patches can be found online via
the QEMU website
* `<https://qemu.org/Contribute/SubmitAPatch>`_
* `<https://qemu.org/Contribute/TrivialPatches>`_
The QEMU website is also maintained under source control.
.. code-block:: shell
git clone https://git.qemu.org/git/qemu-web.git
* `<https://www.qemu.org/2017/02/04/the-new-qemu-website-is-up/>`_
A 'git-publish' utility was created to make above process less
cumbersome, and is highly recommended for making regular contributions,
or even just for sending consecutive patch series revisions. It also
requires a working 'git send-email' setup, and by default doesn't
automate everything, so you may want to go through the above steps
manually for once.
For installation instructions, please go to
* `<https://github.com/stefanha/git-publish>`_
The workflow with 'git-publish' is:
.. code-block:: shell
$ git checkout master -b my-feature
$ # work on new commits, add your 'Signed-off-by' lines to each
$ git publish
Your patch series will be sent and tagged as my-feature-v1 if you need to refer
back to it in the future.
Sending v2:
.. code-block:: shell
$ git checkout my-feature # same topic branch
$ # making changes to the commits (using 'git rebase', for example)
$ git publish
Your patch series will be sent with 'v2' tag in the subject and the git tip
will be tagged as my-feature-v2.
Bug reporting
=============
The QEMU project uses Launchpad as its primary upstream bug tracker. Bugs
found when running code built from QEMU git or upstream released sources
should be reported via:
* `<https://bugs.launchpad.net/qemu/>`_
If using QEMU via an operating system vendor pre-built binary package, it
is preferable to report bugs to the vendor's own bug tracker first. If
the bug is also known to affect latest upstream code, it can also be
reported via launchpad.
For additional information on bug reporting consult:
* `<https://qemu.org/Contribute/ReportABug>`_
Contact
=======
The QEMU community can be contacted in a number of ways, with the two
main methods being email and IRC
* `<mailto:qemu-devel@nongnu.org>`_
* `<https://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/qemu-devel>`_
* #qemu on irc.oftc.net
Information on additional methods of contacting the community can be
found online via the QEMU website:
* `<https://qemu.org/Contribute/StartHere>`_