vmd(8) - OpenBSD manual pages (original) (raw)
NAME
vmd
—virtual machine daemon
SYNOPSIS
vmd | [-dnv] [-D macro=value] [-f file] |
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DESCRIPTION
vmd
is a daemon responsible for the execution of virtual machines (VMs) on a host. vmd
is typically started at boot time and is controlled viavmctl(8).
To have vmd
enabled at boot time, use “rcctl enable vmd”, which sets
vmd_flags=""
vmd
interfaces with the virtual machine monitor (VMM) built into the kernel. One instance ofvmd
will be spawned for each VM running on the host, plus extra instances for control operations. Each childvmd
will in turn create one or more VCPU (virtual CPU) threads responsible for driving the VM's operations usingvmm(4).
vmd
is also responsible for proxying various other commands/requests fromvmctl(8), such as stopping VMs, and retrieving information fromvmm(4) about running VMs.
When the host machine is shut down, vmd
sends each running VM a shutdown request via thevmmci(4) device. If the VMs are vmmci-aware, this provides each VM the chance to shut down cleanly in anticipation of host shutdown. During shutdown,vmd
waits 30 seconds for the VMs to terminate cleanly before forcibly stopping them. This 30 second default can be changed by “rcctl set vmd timeout n”, where 'n' is the desired timeout in seconds.
The options are as follows:
-D macro=value
Define macro to be set tovalue on the command line. Overrides the definition of macro in the configuration file.
Do not daemonize and log tostderr.
-f file
Specify an alternative configuration file. The default is/etc/vm.conf.
Configtest mode. Only check the configuration file for validity.
Verbose mode. Multiple -v
options increase the verbosity.
FILES
/etc/firmware/vmm-bios
Default BIOS boot image. The BIOS is an external firmware file that is distributed separately due to an incompatible license. A prepackaged version of the firmware can be installed usingfw_update(8).
/etc/vm.conf
Default configuration file. This is optional.
/var/run/vmd.sock
UNIX-domain socket used for communication withvmctl(8).
SEE ALSO
vmm(4), vmmci(4), vm.conf(5),rc.conf(8), vmctl(8)
HISTORY
The vmd
command first appeared inOpenBSD 5.9.
Mike Larkin <mlarkin@openbsd.org> and Reyk Floeter <reyk@openbsd.org>.