Hello everyone,
I had some down time and I wanted to learn more about Guile and
Guix, I have used NixOS in the
past and still do for some projects and for work related stuff. In
that context, I've used something called microvm.nix[1]
as a way to create lightweight vm environment and I did miss that
workflow for Guix. I know that (gnu system vm) exists and I did
use
it but it's tied to qemu
With the changes in rust import, it really made packaging rust
application a lot easier. Thank you!
So with that in mind I've packaged `cloud-hypervisor`[2] and
`virtiofsd`[3] and started playing a little
in creating a uniform api, maybe I've played too much?
So I've made a working poc that I've made available as a channel
at https://codeberg.org/pierhugues/microvm.
Keep in mind it's experimental, code is not the best guile code
ever, but we all have to start somewhere.
`microvm` will compile as a derivation but its not really runnable
alone if you share directories from the host.
When you run it with the `microvm-service-type` it will take care
of starting `virtiofsd-service-type` per share.
(service microvm-service-type
(microvm-configuration
(microvm-config
(microvm
(name "complex-vm")
(boot %microvm-base-os)
(vmm cloud-hypervisor)
(memory 256)
(vcpu 1)
(net (list (net
(name "tap3")
(type 'tap)
(mac "02:00:00:00:00:05"))))
(shares
(list (share
(tag "src")
(shared-dir "/home/ph/src/")
(mount-point "/home/microvm/src/")
(readonly? #f)
(type "virtiofs"))
(share
(tag "documents")
(shared-dir "/home/ph/Documents/")
(mount-point
"/home/microvm/Documents")
(type "virtiofs"))))))))
Keep in mind its optimized for happy path (I already said it's
poc), so it doesn't handle validation or edge cases.
But it does the following:
- Start the services required for the shares.
- Ensure that the `operating-system` is configured for the shares
- Make the store available (using volatile)
- A small service to handle the tap creation, need to be done
manually see the readme.org
- Should be able to add a different vmm like firecracker.
- It could also start the vmm with a different image like ubuntu,
I have a hacky config for that.
What is next for me?
Actually I am not sure, I had fun, I've learned a lot.
I will certainly upstream the packages I've made and probably the
services for virtiofsd.
I will continue to hack on the channel and I will see what I'll do
with it.
If there any interest let me know.
--
Thanks
ph
[1]: https://github.com/microvm-nix/microvm.nix
[2]: https://github.com/cloud-hypervisor/cloud-hypervisor/
[3]: https://gitlab.com/virtio-fs/virtiofsd
