2010/1/14 Matthew Booth <mbooth(a)redhat.com&gt;: > I'm trying to use the ESX driver to extract metadata from ESX in an easily > digestible form for driving V2V. I've noticed the domain XML seems to be > missing a few bits: > > <features/> This is currently not implemented, but could be by parsing the CPUIDs. This is on my todo list. > <graphics/> VMware seems to use a certain type of VNC for this, but they use a custom authentication mechanism. There is a Firefox plugin for that (vmware-mks.xpi), but IIRC its Windows only. I think this could be implemented but there is more research necessary what to expose as graphics element.

On Fri, Jan 15, 2010 at 12:04:50PM +0100, Matthias Bolte wrote: > 2010/1/15 Matthias Bolte <matthias.bolte(a)googlemail.com&gt;: > > 2010/1/14 Matthew Booth <mbooth(a)redhat.com&gt;: > >> I'm trying to use the ESX driver to extract metadata from ESX in an easily > >> digestible form for driving V2V. I've noticed the domain XML seems to be > >> missing a few bits: > >> > >> <features/> > > > > This is currently not implemented, but could be by parsing the CPUIDs. > > This is on my todo list. > > > >> <graphics/> > > > > VMware seems to use a certain type of VNC for this, but they use a > > custom authentication mechanism. There is a Firefox plugin for that > > (vmware-mks.xpi), but IIRC its Windows only. I think this could be > > implemented but there is more research necessary what to expose as > > graphics element. Interesting - if there is any docs or source code illustrating this auth mechanism we could try and hook it into GTK-VNC and see if it really does have normalish VNC

> Okay, I should have looked at this in more detail before answering... > > ESX (at least 4.0) supports normal VNC as well. It can be enabled by adding > > RemoteDisplay.vnc.enabled = "true" > RemoteDisplay.vnc.port = "<port>" > RemoteDisplay.vnc.password = "password" > > to the VMX config. I tested it and it works, but I had to manually > open the VNC port range in the ESX firewall using the VI client GUI. I > think this can be done using the VI API, but I'm not sure whether the > ESX driver should do this automatically or if proper firewall > configuration should stay a responsibility of the user. That's the responsibility of hte ESX admin, in same way the Linux host admin has to open the firewall for VNC when using KVM/Xen Daniel

On 15/01/10 10:37, Matthias Bolte wrote: > 2010/1/14 Matthew Booth <mbooth(a)redhat.com&gt;: >> I'm trying to use the ESX driver to extract metadata from ESX in an easily >> digestible form for driving V2V. I've noticed the domain XML seems to be >> missing a few bits: >> >> <features/> > > This is currently not implemented, but could be by parsing the CPUIDs. > This is on my todo list. This would be extremely useful. >> <graphics/> > > VMware seems to use a certain type of VNC for this, but they use a > custom authentication mechanism. There is a Firefox plugin for that > (vmware-mks.xpi), but IIRC its Windows only. I think this could be > implemented but there is more research necessary what to expose as > graphics element. > >> <input/> > > A ESX virtual machine has a PS2 mouse and keyboard by default and > AFAIK that's not changeable. So the ESX driver could output input > elements for them, but the user won't be able to change it when > defining a new virtual machine. Currently input elements are ignored > by the ESX driver. To explain my use case, I'm using the domain XML provided by the ESX driver to form the basis of domain XML for the QEMU driver. I don't need to be able to modify or even access the underlying guest, I just need to know that the devices exist and what drivers they are using. I believe there is more than 1 available graphics device in ESX, so that would be most important.