vmd(8) - OpenBSD manual pages (original) (raw)

NAME

vmd —virtual machine daemon

SYNOPSIS

vmd [-dnv] [-D macro=value] [-f file]

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=""

inrc.conf.local(8).

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.

-d

Do not daemonize and log tostderr.

-f file

Specify an alternative configuration file. The default is/etc/vm.conf.

-n

Configtest mode. Only check the configuration file for validity.

-v

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>.