Just for a quick background:
I have tried to get Xen to compile and function on Ubuntu 10.04 last
year but never could so gave up. I built a new computer to act as a
server and started messing with Xen again about 3 weeks ago and have
tried to compile kernel and xen a dozen times but still having
problems loading Xen. I have read ever post i can find about this
and the steps don't seem very hard in general and I think i have
most of the steps down, but still missing something. So, as a result
i gave in and figured i ask for some advice on my procedure to get
it all working.
I am also still very new to Linux and Xen and so far i find Linux
very finicky and quirky. Once simple example is i downloaded the ATI
Catalyst drivers as a zip file for Linux86_64 for my card, copied
file to FAT32 formatted SD Flash card, later copied the file back to
Debian desktop, extracted it, double clicked on
"amd-driver-installer.run" file, selected "run", type in password
for root access, and than it kept giving me a pop-up message about
"You must be logged in as SUPER-USER to run this file" (did that 6
different times). But, once i re-downloaded the file from the ATI
website, the file ran fine without that message.
My first message here i will explain things in gory detail, hope no
one minds or kills me for it.. :)
Main Goal:
I really just want a server running the latest stable Xen Hypervisor
so i can remotely log into it, create VM images of Windows 7, XP,
and different Linux flavors, install on Windows VM programs and
games to run remotely. This way if i change my server hardware, i
don't need to reinstall windows again, all drivers, all programs all
over again, each and every time. Done that way too much. It is also
important that i get VGA Passthru to work so i can get full video
card acceleration and features in things like AutoCAD or games.
I have looked into XCP (Xen Cloud Platform) and it is very
promising, but don't seem to be very up to date with xen. Very much
like XenServer but they have XenCenter/XenDesktop to manage it,
which seems quite a nice program. However, it is not free and can't
find a free version of XenCenter to manage XCP. I am sure there are
others but still learning. For now just wanted to try a Dom0 with
Xen compiled. Finally, i don't even know how VGA Passthru works on
XCP or if it even does.
Hardware Setup:
Mobo: AMD Asrock Fatal1ty 990FX Professional
CPU: AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition (Unlocked to x4)
RAM: 16GB DDR3-16000 (4x 4GB)
HDD1: Corsair Force3 60GB SSD
HDD2: Seagate Momentus XT 500GB
Video: ATI FirePro V7900 - Driver name, propitiatory (non-free),
"FirePro_8.911.3.1_Linux_X32X64_132092.xip". Latest on ATI website
- All hardware tested for 3-4 days and all seem very stable
- I choose the ATI FirePro V7900 card as it seemed quite a bad-ass
card for AutoCAD and similar, but also has very good support for
Linux drivers, so gets rid of my headache of trying to make other
Video cards to work.
- HDD1 only has Debian 6.0.4 AMD64 and partitioned as:
/ - 50GB
/tmp - 4GB
swap - 1GB
-HDD2 is later going to have LVM volume for VM images (not gotten to
it)
- I wanted to RAID0 two Seagate Momentus XT hard drives to speed up
loading VM images, but from what i read, setting up RAID in linux is
quite a pain. It is better to get a dedicated SATA RAID card, but
those are expensive and spent enough on this setup (video card being
the most expensive).
Software Install Procedure:
- Installed Debian 6.0.4 CD1 from USB
- Selected to install Kernel 2.6.32-5-amd64
- Remove CD-ROM from repository source list
Installed dependent packages
- sudo apt-get install bcc bin86 binutils bison bridge-utils
build-essential bzip2 coreutils debootstrap dkms e2fslibs-dev
fakeroot flex gawk gcc git-core grep gzip iasl initramfs-tools
iproute kernel-package libbz2-dev libc6-dev libconfig-inifiles-perl
libcurl3 libcurl4-openssl-dev libfile-slurp-perl libjpeg62-dev
libncurses5-dev libsdl1.2-dev libtext-template-perl libvncserver-dev
libx11-dev make mercurial mawk module-init-tools ocaml ocaml-findlib
patch pciutils-dev python python-dev python-twisted subversion
texinfo texlive-fonts-extra texlive-fonts-recommended
texlive-latex-base texlive-latex-recommended tgif transfig uuid-dev
zlib1g-dev
Needed for "xconfig"
- sudo apt-get install qt4-dev-tools
For 64bit version of Debian/Ubuntu you need these
- sudo apt-get install gcc-multilib xz-utils
I read on one site that if using version "kernel-package
12.036+nmu1", have to install a patch "linuxv3.diff". Don't know
anything about it, but was following it here:
http://users.wowway.com/~zlinuxman/Kernel.htm
- sudo cp ./Desktop/KERNEL_BUILD/linuxv3.diff
/usr/share/kernel-package
- cd /usr/share/kernel-package
- sudo patch -p1 <linuxv3.diff
- sudo rm linuxv3.diff
Downloaded linux-3.2.12.tar.bz2 from Kernel.org
- cd ./Desktop/KERNEL_BUILD/Kernel
- tar xjf linux-3.2.12.tar.bz2
- cd linux-3.2.12
Make config for new kernel
- make menuconfig (just ran that, saved and exited)
I read that even if you use xconfig should at least run menuconfig
as it needs to create something.
- make xconfig
Than edited the config to include these changes: (I just used gedit
as it seemed faster to use search function for all of these)
CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO=n
CONFIG_PARAVIRT=y
CONFIG_XEN=y
CONFIG_PARAVIRT_GUEST=y
CONFIG_PARAVIRT_SPINLOCKS=y
CONFIG_HVC_DRIVER=y
CONFIG_HVC_XEN=y
CONFIG_XEN_FBDEV_FRONTEND=y
CONFIG_XEN_BLKDEV_FRONTEND=y
CONFIG_XEN_NETDEV_FRONTEND=y
CONFIG_XEN_PCIDEV_FRONTEND=y
CONFIG_INPUT_XEN_KBDDEV_FRONTEND=y
CONFIG_XEN_FBDEV_FRONTEND=y
CONFIG_XEN_XENBUS_FRONTEND=y
CONFIG_XEN_SAVE_RESTORE=y
CONFIG_XEN_GRANT_DEV_ALLOC=m
CONFIG_XEN_TMEM=y
CONFIG_CLEANCACHE=y
CONFIG_FRONTSWAP=y
CONFIG_XEN_SELFBALLOONING=y
QUESTION1: None of the kernel config files i have looked at
had
CONFIG_FRONTSWAP in there. Not 3.2.12, 3.2.11, 3.1.10,
3.0.25, going back to 2.6.32.59. Where can you find that option and
do you really need it? I read this link,
http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTA0MjM, and
said "Cleancache was merged into the Linux kernel last May for the
3.0 release, but the Frontswap support is still missing in action as
the work is more controversial..etc". BUT i can't find any kernel
config that even has it.
CONFIG_X86_IO_APIC=y
CONFIG_ACPI=y
CONFIG_ACPI_PROCFS=y
CONFIG_XEN_DOM0=y
CONFIG_PCI_XEN=y
CONFIG_XEN_DEV_EVTCHN=y
CONFIG_XENFS=y
CONFIG_XEN_COMPAT_XENFS=y
CONFIG_XEN_SYS_HYPERVISOR=y
CONFIG_XEN_GNTDEV=y
CONFIG_XEN_BACKEND=y
CONFIG_XEN_NETDEV_BACKEND=m
CONFIG_XEN_BLKDEV_BACKEND=m
CONFIG_XEN_PCIDEV_BACKEND=m
CONFIG_XEN_PRIVILEGED_GUEST=y
CONFIG_XEN_BALLOON=y
CONFIG_XEN_SCRUB_PAGES=y
CONFIG_XEN_DEV_EVTCHN=y
CONFIG_XEN_GNTDEV=y
QUESTION2: I noticed that 4 items above are set to compile as
module "=m", do they really must be set to "=m" or can they be set
to "=y". I read on a few sites that they started to compile all XEN
options into kernel instead of module. I have done that a few times
during my trial and error, but don't understand if it MUST be "=m"
or "=y".
First time around i had config exactly as listed above. Everything
else i left alone as menuconfig generated.
Compile Kernel
- make-kpkg clean
- sudo fakeroot make-kpkg -j5 --initrd kernel_image kernel_headers
Install Kernel
- cd ..
- sudo dpkg -i linux-headers-3.2.2.12_3.2.12-10.00.Custom_amd64.deb
- sudo dpkg -i linux-image-3.2.2.12_3.2.12-10.00.Custom_amd64.deb
Edit "/etc/default/grub"
- Uncomment #GRUB_DISABLE_LINUX_RECOVERY="true" to disable
generation of recovery mode menu entries. (Only did that as there
were too many menuentries generated after xen was installed)
- Added GRUB_DISABLE_OS_PROBER=true to the end of file
- sudo update-grub2
REBOOTED INTO KERNEL 3.2.12
At this point, it boots into kernel 3.2.12 just fine, nothing i can
tell comes up on screen, gets into login screen and all seems
perfectly ok, SO onto compiling Xen.
Download current stable Xen 4.1.2
- cd ./Desktop/KERNEL_BUILD/Xen
- tar xf xen-4.1.2.tar.gz
- cd xen-4.1.2
Make Xen
- make -j5 xen
- make -j5 tools
- make -j5 stubdom
Install Xen
- sudo make install-xen
- sudo make install-tools PYTHON_PREFIX_ARG=
- sudo make install-stubdom
Updated /etc/modules to read
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
# /etc/modules: kernel modules to load at boot time.
#
# This file contains the names of kernel modules that should be
loaded
# at boot time, one per line. Lines beginning with "#" are ignored.
# Parameters can be specified after the module name.
firewire-sbp2
loop max_loop=64
#The following itmes were added for Xen to run
xen-evtchn
xen-gntdev
xen-netback
xen-blkback
xenfs
blktap
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Update contents of file /etc/grub.d/40_custom
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
#!/bin/sh
exec tail -n +3 $0
# This file provides an easy way to add custom menu entries. Simply
type the
# menu entries you want to add after this comment. Be careful not
to change
# the 'exec tail' line above.
menuentry 'Debian Linux 3.2.12 with XEN 4.1.2' --class debian
--class gnu-linux --class gnu --class os --class xen {
recordfail
set gfxpayload=$linux_gfx_mode
insmod part_msdos
insmod ext2
search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root
b465ee5c-d6ab-4475-a15f-9115a0799b17
set root='(hd0,msdos1)'
search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root
b465ee5c-d6ab-4475-a15f-9115a0799b17
echo 'Loading Linux upd3.2.12 ...'
multiboot /boot/xen-4.1.2.gz placeholder
module /boot/vmlinuz-3.2.11 placeholder
root=UUID=b465ee5c-d6ab-4475-a15f-9115a0799b17 dom0_mem=1024M ro
nomodeset
echo 'Loading initial ramdisk ...'
module /boot/initrd.img-3.2.12
}
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Update Grub
- sudo update-grub2
QUESTION3: When you run update-grub2, WHY does xen create SO
many menuentries? For xen.gz, xen4.gz, xen4.1.gz, xen4.1.2.gz and
syms-xen4.gz or something like that? DO YOU really need all of
those? Can you get rid of them or hide them from "update-grub2"
adding them to the boot menu?
REBOOTED INTO "Debian Linux 3.2.12 with XEN 4.1.2
"
Computer loads grub, i select that menuentry above, it loads the
linux part, but when it gets to the xen, i get a black screen. The
only thing i can see on there is a cursor at the top left hand
corner blinking rapidly, barely visible.
NOW, throughout all of this, i never installed any additional
drivers for my ATI Video card. However, when i start to install it
at different times in the above process, i get different results.
Once i get the black screen with blinking cursor, i reboot into
Kernel 3.2.12, install ATI drivers, than reboot into Xen again, BUT
THIS time i get nothing on the screen, just all black. I have done
this several times, even with Kernel 3.2.11 and still black. I have
not messed with Serial Console Output for debugging, as i have no
cable to second computer, nor would I know how to read the output
messages.
I have installed ATI drivers right after a fresh install of Debian
6.0.4, than i apt-get install all above packages, than ATI drivers
seem to no longer provide 3D acceleration as the graphics seems
sluggish. I re-run the ATI installer, reboot and it is all fine
again. Yet, if i still compile kernel and xen, Xen still wont load.
I did get xen to load just ONCE, with Kernel 3.2.11 when i got the
rapidly blinking cursor screen, i rebooted into plain Kernel 3.2.11,
installed the previously mentioned ATI driver, than xen loaded. But,
i wanted to redo it again, and could never reproduce what i did and
Xen so far has not loaded for me.
All steps seem OK and reasonable to follow, but I am missing
something(s), not doing something in the right order, etc. I have
read the WIKI pages and many others, and keep compiling and trying.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
I know this was a LONG description, but hopefully someone can advice
or give input on anything i wrote here. See what i missed and need
to do different. Thank you very much to any and all.
