libvirt/docs/formatdomaincaps.html.in
Sebastian Mitterle 5eaa9a1cc3 docs: Add version info for 'backingStoreInput' in domaincaps
Add 'since 5.10' as commonly used in formatdomain to avoid
misunderstandings if element is not present (Is it not supported
because of my version or because of my environment?)

Signed-off-by: Sebastian Mitterle <smitterl@redhat.com>
Reviewed-by: Peter Krempa <pkrempa@redhat.com>
2020-04-24 09:52:32 +02:00

605 lines
21 KiB
XML

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<body>
<h1>Domain capabilities XML format</h1>
<ul id="toc"></ul>
<h2><a id="Overview">Overview</a></h2>
<p>Sometimes, when a new domain is to be created it may come handy to know
the capabilities of the hypervisor so the correct combination of devices and
drivers is used. For example, when management application is considering the
mode for a host device's passthrough there are several options depending not
only on host, but on hypervisor in question too. If the hypervisor is qemu
then it needs to be more recent to support VFIO, while legacy KVM is
achievable just fine with older qemus.</p>
<p>The main difference between
<a href="/html/libvirt-libvirt-host.html#virConnectGetCapabilities">
<code>virConnectGetCapabilities</code>
</a>
and the emulator capabilities API is, the former one aims more on
the host capabilities (e.g. NUMA topology, security models in
effect, etc.) while the latter one specializes on the hypervisor
capabilities.</p>
<p>While the <a href="formatcaps.html">Driver Capabilities</a> provides the
host capabilities (e.g NUMA topology, security models in effect, etc.), the
Domain Capabilities provides the hypervisor specific capabilities for
Management Applications to query and make decisions regarding what to
utilize.</p>
<p>The Domain Capabilities can provide information such as the correct
combination of devices and drivers that are supported. Knowing which host
and hypervisor specific options are available or supported would allow the
management application to choose an appropriate mode for a pass-through
host device as well as which adapter to utilize.</p>
<p>Some XML elements may be entirely omitted from the domaincapabilities
XML, depending on what the libvirt driver has filled in. Applications
should only act on what is explicitly reported in the domaincapabilities
XML. For example, if &lt;disk supported='yes'/&gt; is present, you can safely
assume the driver supports &lt;disk&gt; devices. If &lt;disk supported='no'/&gt; is
present, you can safely assume the driver does NOT support &lt;disk&gt;
devices. If the &lt;disk&gt; block is omitted entirely, the driver is not
indicating one way or the other whether it supports &lt;disk&gt; devices, and
applications should not interpret the missing block to mean any thing in
particular.</p>
<h2><a id="elements">Element and attribute overview</a></h2>
<p> A new query interface was added to the virConnect API's to retrieve the
XML listing of the set of domain capabilities (<span class="since">Since
1.2.7</span>):</p>
<pre>
<a href="/html/libvirt-libvirt-domain.html#virConnectGetDomainCapabilities">virConnectGetDomainCapabilities</a>
</pre>
<p>The root element that emulator capability XML document starts with has
name <code>domainCapabilities</code>. It contains at least four direct
child elements:</p>
<pre>
&lt;domainCapabilities&gt;
&lt;path&gt;/usr/bin/qemu-system-x86_64&lt;/path&gt;
&lt;domain&gt;kvm&lt;/domain&gt;
&lt;machine&gt;pc-i440fx-2.1&lt;/machine&gt;
&lt;arch&gt;x86_64&lt;/arch&gt;
...
&lt;/domainCapabilities&gt;
</pre>
<dl>
<dt><code>path</code></dt>
<dd>The full path to the emulator binary.</dd>
<dt><code>domain</code></dt>
<dd>Describes the <a href="formatdomain.html#elements">virtualization
type</a> (or so called domain type).</dd>
<dt><code>machine</code></dt>
<dd>The domain's <a href="formatdomain.html#elementsOSBIOS">machine
type</a>. Since not every hypervisor has a sense of machine types
this element might be omitted in such drivers.</dd>
<dt><code>arch</code></dt>
<dd>The domain's <a href="formatdomain.html#elementsOSBIOS">
architecture</a>.</dd>
</dl>
<h3><a id="elementsCPUAllocation">CPU Allocation</a></h3>
<p>Before any devices capability occurs, there might be info on domain
wide capabilities, e.g. virtual CPUs:</p>
<pre>
&lt;domainCapabilities&gt;
...
&lt;vcpu max='255'/&gt;
...
&lt;/domainCapabilities&gt;
</pre>
<dl>
<dt><code>vcpu</code></dt>
<dd>The maximum number of supported virtual CPUs</dd>
</dl>
<h3><a id="elementsOSBIOS">BIOS bootloader</a></h3>
<p>Sometimes users might want to tweak some BIOS knobs or use
UEFI. For cases like that, <a
href="formatdomain.html#elementsOSBIOS"><code>os</code></a>
element exposes what values can be passed to its children.</p>
<pre>
&lt;domainCapabilities&gt;
...
&lt;os supported='yes'&gt;
&lt;enum name='firmware'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;bios&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;efi&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;/enum&gt;
&lt;loader supported='yes'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;/usr/share/OVMF/OVMF_CODE.fd&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;enum name='type'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;rom&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;pflash&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;/enum&gt;
&lt;enum name='readonly'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;yes&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;no&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;/enum&gt;
&lt;enum name='secure'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;yes&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;no&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;/enum&gt;
&lt;/loader&gt;
&lt;/os&gt;
...
&lt;domainCapabilities&gt;
</pre>
<p>The <code>firmware</code> enum corresponds to the
<code>firmware</code> attribute of the <code>os</code> element in
the domain XML. The presence of this enum means libvirt is capable
of the so-called firmware auto-selection feature. And the listed
firmware values represent the accepted input in the domain
XML. Note that the <code>firmware</code> enum reports only those
values for which a firmware "descriptor file" exists on the host.
Firmware descriptor file is a small JSON document that describes
details about a given BIOS or UEFI binary on the host, e.g. the
fimware binary path, its architecture, supported machine types,
NVRAM template, etc. This ensures that the reported values won't
cause a failure on guest boot.
</p>
<p>For the <code>loader</code> element, the following can occur:</p>
<dl>
<dt><code>value</code></dt>
<dd>List of known firmware binary paths. Currently this is used
only to advertise the known location of OVMF binaries for
QEMU. OVMF binaries will only be listed if they actually exist on
host.</dd>
<dt><code>type</code></dt>
<dd>Whether the boot loader is a typical BIOS (<code>rom</code>)
or a UEFI firmware (<code>pflash</code>). Each <code>value</code>
sub-element under the <code>type</code> enum represents a possible
value for the <code>type</code> attribute for the &lt;loader/&gt;
element in the domain XML. E.g. the presence
of <code>pfalsh</code> under the <code>type</code> enum means that
a domain XML can use UEFI firmware via: &lt;loader/&gt;
type="pflash" ...&gt;/path/to/the/firmware/binary/&lt;/loader&gt;.
</dd>
<dt><code>readonly</code></dt>
<dd>Options for the <code>readonly</code> attribute of the
&lt;loader/&gt; element in the domain XML.</dd>
<dt><code>secure</code></dt>
<dd>Options for the <code>secure</code> attribute of the
&lt;loader/&gt; element in the domain XML. Note that the
value <code>yes</code> is listed only if libvirt detects a
firmware descriptor file that has path to an OVMF binary that
supports Secure boot, and lists its architecture and supported
machine type.</dd>
</dl>
<h3><a id="elementsCPU">CPU configuration</a></h3>
<p>
The <code>cpu</code> element exposes options usable for configuring
<a href="formatdomain.html#elementsCPU">guest CPUs</a>.
</p>
<pre>
&lt;domainCapabilities&gt;
...
&lt;cpu&gt;
&lt;mode name='host-passthrough' supported='yes'/&gt;
&lt;mode name='host-model' supported='yes'&gt;
&lt;model fallback='allow'&gt;Broadwell&lt;/model&gt;
&lt;vendor&gt;Intel&lt;/vendor&gt;
&lt;feature policy='disable' name='aes'/&gt;
&lt;feature policy='require' name='vmx'/&gt;
&lt;/mode&gt;
&lt;mode name='custom' supported='yes'&gt;
&lt;model usable='no'&gt;Broadwell&lt;/model&gt;
&lt;model usable='yes'&gt;Broadwell-noTSX&lt;/model&gt;
&lt;model usable='no'&gt;Haswell&lt;/model&gt;
...
&lt;/mode&gt;
&lt;/cpu&gt;
...
&lt;domainCapabilities&gt;
</pre>
<p>
Each CPU mode understood by libvirt is described with a
<code>mode</code> element which tells whether the particular mode
is supported and provides (when applicable) more details about it:
</p>
<dl>
<dt><code>host-passthrough</code></dt>
<dd>No mode specific details are provided.</dd>
<dt><code>host-model</code></dt>
<dd>
If <code>host-model</code> is supported by the hypervisor, the
<code>mode</code> describes the guest CPU which will be used when
starting a domain with <code>host-model</code> CPU. The hypervisor
specifics (such as unsupported CPU models or features, machine type,
etc.) may be accounted for in this guest CPU specification and thus
the CPU can be different from the one shown in host capabilities XML.
This is indicated by the <code>fallback</code> attribute of the
<code>model</code> sub element: <code>allow</code> means not all
specifics were accounted for and thus the CPU a guest will see may
be different; <code>forbid</code> indicates that the CPU a guest will
see should match this CPU definition.
</dd>
<dt><code>custom</code></dt>
<dd>
The <code>mode</code> element contains a list of supported CPU
models, each described by a dedicated <code>model</code> element.
The <code>usable</code> attribute specifies whether the model can
be used directly on the host. When usable='no' the corresponding model
cannot be used without disabling some features that the CPU of such
model is expected to have. A special value <code>unknown</code>
indicates libvirt does not have enough information to provide the
usability data.
</dd>
</dl>
<h3><a id="elementsIothreads">I/O Threads</a></h3>
<p>
The <code>iothread</code> elements indicates whether or not
<a href="formatdomain.html#elementsIOThreadsAllocation">I/O threads</a>
are supported.
</p>
<pre>
&lt;domainCapabilities&gt;
...
&lt;iothread supported='yes'/&gt;
...
&lt;domainCapabilities&gt;
</pre>
<h3><a id="elementsDevices">Devices</a></h3>
<p>
Another set of XML elements describe the supported devices and their
capabilities. All devices occur as children of the main
<code>devices</code> element.
</p>
<pre>
&lt;domainCapabilities&gt;
...
&lt;devices&gt;
&lt;disk supported='yes'&gt;
&lt;enum name='diskDevice'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;disk&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;cdrom&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;floppy&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;lun&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;/enum&gt;
...
&lt;/disk&gt;
&lt;hostdev supported='no'/&gt;
&lt;/devices&gt;
&lt;/domainCapabilities&gt;
</pre>
<p>Reported capabilities are expressed as an enumerated list of available
options for each of the element or attribute. For example, the
&lt;disk/&gt; element has an attribute <code>device</code> which can
support the values <code>disk</code>, <code>cdrom</code>,
<code>floppy</code>, or <code>lun</code>.</p>
<h4><a id="elementsDisks">Hard drives, floppy disks, CDROMs</a></h4>
<p>Disk capabilities are exposed under the <code>disk</code> element. For
instance:</p>
<pre>
&lt;domainCapabilities&gt;
...
&lt;devices&gt;
&lt;disk supported='yes'&gt;
&lt;enum name='diskDevice'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;disk&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;cdrom&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;floppy&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;lun&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;/enum&gt;
&lt;enum name='bus'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;ide&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;fdc&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;scsi&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;virtio&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;xen&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;usb&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;sata&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;sd&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;/enum&gt;
&lt;/disk&gt;
...
&lt;/devices&gt;
&lt;/domainCapabilities&gt;
</pre>
<dl>
<dt><code>diskDevice</code></dt>
<dd>Options for the <code>device</code> attribute of the &lt;disk/&gt;
element.</dd>
<dt><code>bus</code></dt>
<dd>Options for the <code>bus</code> attribute of the &lt;target/&gt;
element for a &lt;disk/&gt;.</dd>
</dl>
<h4><a id="elementsGraphics">Graphical framebuffers</a></h4>
<p>Graphics device capabilities are exposed under the
<code>graphics</code> element. For instance:</p>
<pre>
&lt;domainCapabilities&gt;
...
&lt;devices&gt;
&lt;graphics supported='yes'&gt;
&lt;enum name='type'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;sdl&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;vnc&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;spice&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;/enum&gt;
&lt;/graphics&gt;
...
&lt;/devices&gt;
&lt;/domainCapabilities&gt;
</pre>
<dl>
<dt><code>type</code></dt>
<dd>Options for the <code>type</code> attribute of the &lt;graphics/&gt;
element.</dd>
</dl>
<h4><a id="elementsVideo">Video device</a></h4>
<p>Video device capabilities are exposed under the
<code>video</code> element. For instance:</p>
<pre>
&lt;domainCapabilities&gt;
...
&lt;devices&gt;
&lt;video supported='yes'&gt;
&lt;enum name='modelType'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;vga&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;cirrus&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;vmvga&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;qxl&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;virtio&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;/enum&gt;
&lt;/video&gt;
...
&lt;/devices&gt;
&lt;/domainCapabilities&gt;
</pre>
<dl>
<dt><code>modelType</code></dt>
<dd>Options for the <code>type</code> attribute of the
&lt;video&gt;&lt;model&gt; element.</dd>
</dl>
<h4><a id="elementsHostDev">Host device assignment</a></h4>
<p>Some host devices can be passed through to a guest (e.g. USB, PCI and
SCSI). Well, only if the following is enabled:</p>
<pre>
&lt;domainCapabilities&gt;
...
&lt;devices&gt;
&lt;hostdev supported='yes'&gt;
&lt;enum name='mode'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;subsystem&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;capabilities&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;/enum&gt;
&lt;enum name='startupPolicy'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;default&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;mandatory&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;requisite&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;optional&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;/enum&gt;
&lt;enum name='subsysType'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;usb&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;pci&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;scsi&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;/enum&gt;
&lt;enum name='capsType'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;storage&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;misc&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;net&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;/enum&gt;
&lt;enum name='pciBackend'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;default&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;kvm&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;vfio&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;xen&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;/enum&gt;
&lt;/hostdev&gt;
&lt;/devices&gt;
&lt;/domainCapabilities&gt;
</pre>
<dl>
<dt><code>mode</code></dt>
<dd>Options for the <code>mode</code> attribute of the &lt;hostdev/&gt;
element.</dd>
<dt><code>startupPolicy</code></dt>
<dd>Options for the <code>startupPolicy</code> attribute of the
&lt;hostdev/&gt; element.</dd>
<dt><code>subsysType</code></dt>
<dd>Options for the <code>type</code> attribute of the &lt;hostdev/&gt;
element in case of <code>mode="subsystem"</code>.</dd>
<dt><code>capsType</code></dt>
<dd>Options for the <code>type</code> attribute of the &lt;hostdev/&gt;
element in case of <code>mode="capabilities"</code>.</dd>
<dt><code>pciBackend</code></dt>
<dd>Options for the <code>name</code> attribute of the &lt;driver/&gt;
element.</dd>
</dl>
<h4><a id="elementsRNG">RNG device</a></h4>
<p>RNG device capabilities are exposed under the
<code>rng</code> element. For instance:</p>
<pre>
&lt;domainCapabilities&gt;
...
&lt;devices&gt;
&lt;rng supported='yes'&gt;
&lt;enum name='model'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;virtio&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;virtio-transitional&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;virtio-non-transitional&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;/enum&gt;
&lt;enum name='backendModel'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;random&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;egd&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;builtin&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;/enum&gt;
&lt;/rng&gt;
...
&lt;/devices&gt;
&lt;/domainCapabilities&gt;
</pre>
<dl>
<dt><code>model</code></dt>
<dd>Options for the <code>model</code> attribute of the
&lt;rng&gt; element.</dd>
<dt><code>backendModel</code></dt>
<dd>Options for the <code>model</code> attribute of the
&lt;rng&gt;&lt;backend&gt; element.</dd>
</dl>
<h3><a id="elementsFeatures">Features</a></h3>
<p>One more set of XML elements describe the supported features and
their capabilities. All features occur as children of the main
<code>features</code> element.</p>
<pre>
&lt;domainCapabilities&gt;
...
&lt;features&gt;
&lt;gic supported='yes'&gt;
&lt;enum name='version'&gt;
&lt;value&gt;2&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;value&gt;3&lt;/value&gt;
&lt;/enum&gt;
&lt;/gic&gt;
&lt;vmcoreinfo supported='yes'/&gt;
&lt;genid supported='yes'/&gt;
&lt;backingStoreInput supported='yes'/&gt;
&lt;backup supported='yes'/&gt;
&lt;sev&gt;
&lt;cbitpos&gt;47&lt;/cbitpos&gt;
&lt;reduced-phys-bits&gt;1&lt;/reduced-phys-bits&gt;
&lt;/sev&gt;
&lt;/features&gt;
&lt;/domainCapabilities&gt;
</pre>
<p>Reported capabilities are expressed as an enumerated list of
possible values for each of the elements or attributes. For example, the
<code>gic</code> element has an attribute <code>version</code> which can
support the values <code>2</code> or <code>3</code>.</p>
<p>For information about the purpose of each feature, see the
<a href="formatdomain.html#elementsFeatures">relevant section</a> in
the domain XML documentation.
</p>
<h4><a id="elementsGIC">GIC capabilities</a></h4>
<p>GIC capabilities are exposed under the <code>gic</code> element.</p>
<dl>
<dt><code>version</code></dt>
<dd>Options for the <code>version</code> attribute of the
<code>gic</code> element.</dd>
</dl>
<h4><a id="elementsvmcoreinfo">vmcoreinfo</a></h4>
<p>Reports whether the vmcoreinfo feature can be enabled.</p>
<h4><a id="elementsgenid">genid</a></h4>
<p>Reports whether the genid feature can be used by the domain.</p>
<h4><a id="featureBackingStoreInput">backingStoreInput</a></h4>
<p>Reports whether the hypervisor will obey the &lt;backingStore&gt;
elements configured for a &lt;disk&gt; when booting the guest, hotplugging
the disk to a running guest, or similar.
<span class="since">(Since 5.10)</span>
</p>
<h4><a id="featureBackup">backup</a></h4>
<p>Reports whether the hypervisor supports the backup, checkpoint, and
related features. (<code>virDomainBackupBegin</code>,
<code>virDomainCheckpointCreateXML</code> etc). The presence of the
<code>backup</code> element even if <code>supported='no'</code> implies that
the <code>VIR_DOMAIN_UNDEFINE_CHECKPOINTS_METADATA</code> flag for
<code>virDomainUndefine</code> is supported.
</p>
<h4><a id="elementsSEV">SEV capabilities</a></h4>
<p>AMD Secure Encrypted Virtualization (SEV) capabilities are exposed under
the <code>sev</code> element.
SEV is an extension to the AMD-V architecture which supports running
virtual machines (VMs) under the control of a hypervisor. When supported,
guest owner can create a VM whose memory contents will be transparently
encrypted with a key unique to that VM.</p>
<p>
For more details on the SEV feature, please follow resources in the
AMD developer's document store. In order to use SEV with libvirt have
a look at <a href="formatdomain.html#launchSecurity">SEV in domain XML</a>
</p>
<dl>
<dt><code>cbitpos</code></dt>
<dd>When memory encryption is enabled, one of the physical address bits
(aka the C-bit) is utilized to mark if a memory page is protected. The
C-bit position is Hypervisor dependent.</dd>
<dt><code>reducedPhysBits</code></dt>
<dd>When memory encryption is enabled, we lose certain bits in physical
address space. The number of bits we lose is hypervisor dependent.</dd>
</dl>
</body>
</html>