Block driver documentation is available in qemu-doc.html. It would be
convenient to have documentation for formats, protocols, and filter
drivers in a man page.
Extract the relevant part of qemu-doc.html into a new file called
docs/qemu-block-drivers.texi. This file can also be built as a
stand-alone document (man, html, etc).
Signed-off-by: Stefan Hajnoczi
---
v5:
* Dropped .html, .info, and .txt due to cross-platform texi toolchain
issues (qemu-img.texi also supports man output only) after Kevin
reported warnings
---
Makefile | 5 +-
docs/qemu-block-drivers.texi | 804 +++
qemu-doc.texi| 781 +
3 files changed, 809 insertions(+), 781 deletions(-)
create mode 100644 docs/qemu-block-drivers.texi
diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
index 81447b1f08..8668d9e7e4 100644
--- a/Makefile
+++ b/Makefile
@@ -209,6 +209,7 @@ ifdef BUILD_DOCS
DOCS=qemu-doc.html qemu-doc.txt qemu.1 qemu-img.1 qemu-nbd.8 qemu-ga.8
DOCS+=docs/interop/qemu-qmp-ref.html docs/interop/qemu-qmp-ref.txt
docs/interop/qemu-qmp-ref.7
DOCS+=docs/interop/qemu-ga-ref.html docs/interop/qemu-ga-ref.txt
docs/interop/qemu-ga-ref.7
+DOCS+=docs/qemu-block-drivers.7
ifdef CONFIG_VIRTFS
DOCS+=fsdev/virtfs-proxy-helper.1
endif
@@ -528,6 +529,7 @@ distclean: clean
rm -f docs/interop/qemu-qmp-ref.txt docs/interop/qemu-ga-ref.txt
rm -f docs/interop/qemu-qmp-ref.pdf docs/interop/qemu-ga-ref.pdf
rm -f docs/interop/qemu-qmp-ref.html docs/interop/qemu-ga-ref.html
+ rm -f docs/qemu-block-drivers.7
for d in $(TARGET_DIRS); do \
rm -rf $$d || exit 1 ; \
done
@@ -573,6 +575,7 @@ ifdef CONFIG_POSIX
$(INSTALL_DATA) qemu.1 "$(DESTDIR)$(mandir)/man1"
$(INSTALL_DIR) "$(DESTDIR)$(mandir)/man7"
$(INSTALL_DATA) docs/interop/qemu-qmp-ref.7 "$(DESTDIR)$(mandir)/man7"
+ $(INSTALL_DATA) docs/qemu-block-drivers.7 "$(DESTDIR)$(mandir)/man7"
ifneq ($(TOOLS),)
$(INSTALL_DATA) qemu-img.1 "$(DESTDIR)$(mandir)/man1"
$(INSTALL_DIR) "$(DESTDIR)$(mandir)/man8"
@@ -727,7 +730,7 @@ txt: qemu-doc.txt docs/interop/qemu-qmp-ref.txt
docs/interop/qemu-ga-ref.txt
qemu-doc.html qemu-doc.info qemu-doc.pdf qemu-doc.txt: \
qemu-img.texi qemu-nbd.texi qemu-options.texi qemu-option-trace.texi \
qemu-monitor.texi qemu-img-cmds.texi qemu-ga.texi \
- qemu-monitor-info.texi
+ qemu-monitor-info.texi docs/qemu-block-drivers.texi
docs/interop/qemu-ga-ref.dvi docs/interop/qemu-ga-ref.html \
docs/interop/qemu-ga-ref.info docs/interop/qemu-ga-ref.pdf \
diff --git a/docs/qemu-block-drivers.texi b/docs/qemu-block-drivers.texi
new file mode 100644
index 00..1cb1e55686
--- /dev/null
+++ b/docs/qemu-block-drivers.texi
@@ -0,0 +1,804 @@
+@c man begin SYNOPSIS
+QEMU block driver reference manual
+@c man end
+
+@c man begin DESCRIPTION
+
+@node disk_images_formats
+@subsection Disk image file formats
+
+QEMU supports many image file formats that can be used with VMs as well as with
+any of the tools (like @code{qemu-img}). This includes the preferred formats
+raw and qcow2 as well as formats that are supported for compatibility with
+older QEMU versions or other hypervisors.
+
+Depending on the image format, different options can be passed to
+@code{qemu-img create} and @code{qemu-img convert} using the @code{-o} option.
+This section describes each format and the options that are supported for it.
+
+@table @option
+@item raw
+
+Raw disk image format. This format has the advantage of
+being simple and easily exportable to all other emulators. If your
+file system supports @emph{holes} (for example in ext2 or ext3 on
+Linux or NTFS on Windows), then only the written sectors will reserve
+space. Use @code{qemu-img info} to know the real size used by the
+image or @code{ls -ls} on Unix/Linux.
+
+Supported options:
+@table @code
+@item preallocation
+Preallocation mode (allowed values: @code{off}, @code{falloc}, @code{full}).
+@code{falloc} mode preallocates space for image by calling posix_fallocate().
+@code{full} mode preallocates space for image by writing zeros to underlying
+storage.
+@end table
+
+@item qcow2
+QEMU image format, the most versatile format. Use it to have smaller
+images (useful if your filesystem does not supports holes, for example
+on Windows), zlib based compression and support of multiple VM
+snapshots.
+
+Supported options:
+@table @code
+@item compat
+Determines the qcow2 version to use. @code{compat=0.10} uses the
+traditional image format that can be read by any QEMU since 0.10.
+@code{compat=1.1} enables image format extensions that only QEMU 1.1 and
+newer understand (this is the default). Amongst others, this includes
+zero clusters, which allow efficient copy-on-read for sparse images.
+
+@item backing_file
+File name of a base image (see @option{create} subcommand)
+@item backing_fmt
+Image format of the bas
