Xen virtual machines

• Xen Server dom0
• Xen Client domU

Xen Server dom0

You should create a partition a bit larger than the amount of ram allocated to domU guests. If you shutdown the dom0, the domU guests are saved state to '/var/lib/xen/save'

lvcreate --size 4.1g --name xen vg01
mkdir /var/lib/xen

And add to /etc/fstab

/dev/mapper/vg01-xen /var/lib/xen            reiserfs noatime         0       2

and mount

mount /var/lib/xen

Xen Client domU

Below 'vm01' is the hostname of my VirtualMachine

lvcreate --size 600M -i 2 --name vm01-slash vg01
lvcreate --size 2G -i 2 --name vm01-swap vg01
lvcreate --size 10G -i 2 --name vm01-usr vg01
lvcreate --size 4G -i 2 --name vm01-var vg01

mkfs.ext3 /dev/vg01/vm01-slash
mkswap /dev/vg01/vm01-swap
mkfs.reiserfs /dev/vg01/vm01-usr
mkfs.reiserfs /dev/vg01/vm01-var

mount /dev/vg01/vm01-slash /mnt/
mkdir /mnt/usr /mnt/var
mount /dev/vg01/vm01-usr /mnt/usr/
mount /dev/vg01/vm01-var /mnt/var/

debootstrap --arch amd64 --include=reiserfsprogs,linux-image-2.6-xen-amd64,ssh lenny /mnt

cd /mnt
cp /etc/hosts etc/
sed -i 's/xen01/vm01/g' etc/hosts
echo vm01 > etc/hostname
cp /etc/apt/sources.list /etc/apt/preferences etc/apt/

etc/network/interfaces:

# This file describes the network interfaces available on your system
# and how to activate them. For more information, see interfaces(5).

# The loopback network interface
auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

# The primary network interface
auto eth0
iface eth0 inet static
        address 1.2.3.4
        netmask 255.255.255.0
        gateway 1.2.3.1

etc/fstab:

# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# <file system> <mount point>   <type>  <options>       <dump>  <pass>
proc            /proc           proc    defaults        0       0
/dev/sda1        /               ext3    defaults,errors=remount-ro 0       1
/dev/sda3 /usr            reiserfs defaults        0       2
/dev/sda4 /var            reiserfs noatime        0       2
/dev/sda2 none            swap    sw              0       0
/dev/hda        /media/cdrom0   udf,iso9660 user,noauto     0       0

boot/grub/menu.lst:

title           Debian GNU/Linux, kernel 2.6.26-2-xen-amd64
root            (hd0,0)
kernel          /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.26-2-xen-amd64 root=/dev/sda1 xencons=tty ro
initrd          /boot/initrd.img-2.6.26-2-xen-amd64

title           Debian GNU/Linux, kernel 2.6.26-2-xen-amd64 (single-user mode)
root            (hd0,0)
kernel          /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.26-2-xen-amd64 root=/dev/sda1 xencons=tty ro single
initrd          /boot/initrd.img-2.6.26-2-xen-amd64

/etc/xen/vm01.cfg:

# Debian 5.0
memory = 1024
name = "vm01"
bootloader = "/usr/lib/xen-3.2-1/bin/pygrub"
disk = [ 'phy:vg01/vm01-slash,sda1,w', 'phy:vg01/vm01-swap,sda2,w', 'phy:vg01/vm01-usr,sda3,w', 'phy:vg01/vm01-var,sda4,w' ]
# Default bridged network interface
vif = [ 'bridge=xenbr0' ]
vcpus = 2
# Single-user mode
#extra = "1"

umount /mnt/usr /mnt/var /mnt
cd /etc/xen/auto
ln -s ../vm01.cfg .
xm create -c vm01.cfg

After boot you need to:

1. Set a root password, create local user accounts
2. dpkg-reconfigure tzdata
3. dpkg-reconfigure exim4-config