Interesting discussions.... How about exporting a ZFS volume as the guest domain backend? Can I then change the size of the boot drive? And would I get better performance that a flat file?
On Thu, Feb 18, 2010 at 1:29 PM, Alexandre Chartre < Alexandre.Chartre at sun.com> wrote: > > On 02/18/10 10:18, Joseph Balenzano wrote: > >> Slightly, off topic, but relevant to expanding the size of a disk back end >> that is a file. I created a vdisk which >> was an iso file of the Solaris installation DVD. This was defined as the >> cdrom for an LDom. During the installation of the LDom it became apparent >> the iso file was corrupt, so I just downloaded another iso and replaced the >> disk back end iso file with it. Started the install again, but got the same >> sort of install issues which lead me to believe that the file was still >> corrupted. After a few more times of this happening it occurred to me, that >> I never really replaced the original file because another process (virtual >> disk server) had the old file open, so it was still using it. Rebooting the >> control domain, solved my problem. My question is, would a ldm unbind have >> accomplished the same (i.e. forced the vds server to close the original >> file)? >> > > Yes, that would have worked. The vdisk backend is opened/closed when the > domain is bound/unbound. > > > If you indeed are going to expand a disk file, that is the back end >> device, what would you have to do in the I/O domain and the guest domain. >> to prepare for this? My guess is you could not do this while the LDom that >> is consuming the disk is running. >> > > It should work while the domain is running, because in that case the > file vnode (which is used by vds in the service domain) remains the same, > only some information in the vnode will change; and the vds/vdc drivers > are designed to support a dynamic change of the backend size. > > alex. > > > > Alexandre Chartre wrote: >> >>> >>> As Octave said, there's no easy way to expand the size of a file. >>> It is possible to do it using some dd command or a simple C program >>> but you have to be very careful because you can easily corrupt or >>> destroy the file. >>> >>> To make things easier, I have opened a RFE to improve the mkfile >>> command so that it can be used to increased the size of an existing >>> file: >>> >>> 6925784 mkfile should be able to change/increase the size of an existing >>> file >>> >>> Please add yourself to the RFE so that it gets a higher priority. >>> >>> alex. >>> >>> >>> On 02/18/10 08:03, Octave Orgeron wrote: >>> >>>> Hi, >>>> >>>> If you are using sparse files on any file system, there isn't an easy >>>> way of expanding the size of these files. You would instead create another >>>> sparse file, add it to the VDS service, and added as a VDISK to the guest. >>>> From within the guest, the new VDISK can be formatted and attached to your >>>> ZFS or SDS volumes. >>>> >>>> While sparse files are easy to move around and copy, you could also use >>>> ZFS volumes which do perform better. >>>> >>>> *-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-* >>>> >>>> Octave J. Orgeron >>>> Solaris Virtualization Architect and Consultant >>>> Web: http://unixconsole.blogspot.com >>>> E-Mail: unixconsole at yahoo.com >>>> *-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-* >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------ >>>> *From:* Tony MacDoodle <tpsdoodle at gmail.com> >>>> *To:* ldoms-discuss at opensolaris.org >>>> *Sent:* Wed, February 17, 2010 8:00:15 PM >>>> *Subject:* [ldoms-discuss] Expanding ZFS Files for Bootdisks >>>> >>>> Is it possible to increase the size of the boot disks I created for >>>> guest domains? They are currently files created on a ZFS file system. For >>>> example, I have created 60G boot disks for 2 guest domains on ZFS and I now >>>> want to increase the size of these disks? >>>> >>>> Thanks >>>> >>>> >>>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------ >>>> >>>> _______________________________________________ >>>> ldoms-discuss mailing list >>>> ldoms-discuss at opensolaris.org >>>> http://mail.opensolaris.org/mailman/listinfo/ldoms-discuss >>>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> ldoms-discuss mailing list >>> ldoms-discuss at opensolaris.org >>> http://mail.opensolaris.org/mailman/listinfo/ldoms-discuss >>> >> >> >> -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://mail.opensolaris.org/pipermail/ldoms-discuss/attachments/20100218/046cc64b/attachment.html>
