Virtual Iron - Xen based Virtual Machine solution
NOTE - I am a disruptive user - I typically explore new(er) technology offerings in a manner that vendors might not prefer so please note that your mileage should vary, especially if you are a non-disruptive user… 
Xen? I thought that Xen = Citrix?
Yes and no… The Citrix product line includes technologies developed/derived from the Xen Open Source project. Virtual Iron is another commercial offering based on the Xen Open Source project.
First - Xen is a ‘bare metal’ solution - you boot the Xen Hypervisor as part of your OS; this is in contrast to an emulation mode based virtual machine solution (i.e. VirtualBox as discussed elsewhere on this site.)
Second - Virtual Iron provides both a free (limited number of VMs and features) and a data-center appropriate version (with a 30 day free trial.)
VirtualIron - first impressions
- easy to use, informative web site
- requires registration to download either the free or commercial offering (I’m in the instant camp - why make me wait? - I could be reviewing your info while I wait for the download to complete…)
- you can’t download the free offering until you get an email with the download information (and the site indicates that this will take ’some time’…)
- several overview and help links/documents are provided (chances are my exploration of this solution will be placed on the back burner since there are a number of other items on my review list…)
Waiting… Whoops! Where did that email come from? (It arrived shortly after my request…) I see an invite to try the Enterprise Edition but where is the Free Edition download? I will proceed with this trial offering (noting that we are downloading from the Amazon cloud...)
Hmm - the download page offers both a Windows and a Linux version. I also note a message that ‘the latest Java JRE is needed for…” - I’m not a Java fan so this goes into the negative camp… Both versions are downloaded from the cloud in ~10 minutes via cable-modem (Windows - ~210MB, Linux - ~ 180 MB.)
Since this is a Xen based virtualization solution I expect to have both a command-line as well as a GUI (graphics user interface) means of managing the VMs. Ok, back to review the documentation - hmm, there is a link to an online eLearning offering - Ok, I click and now I get YAUIR page! (yet another user information request.) Hmm, you would think that this could be tracked from the initial email… I enter my info and proceed to an ERROR page! I don’t have flash installed on my Linux boxen - so If you want to view this you will need a browser with Flash support (I just copy the link to my VirtualBox XP VM and off we go…)
The six minute presentation begins…
- - HCL specs are reviewed - management server with 2GB RAM, 32 GB disk, supported OS versions (note that Fedora is NOT supported...)
- - disable your firewall and virus software…
- - yada, yada, yada…
Ok, this does not sound like what I was looking for (a VM solution to test on a single computer); this is the data-center version; the presentation covers the basics for using a control system along with separate physical boxes to run/control/manage. Also, there is another suggestion to get the latest JRE (so in my mind, visions of Java problems begin to form - in the same way as real problems emerged with the JBoss solution used by VMware…) At this point I will stop this effort and re-visit the VirtualIron web to see if I can download the ‘free‘ version…
I return to the VirtualIron web site and note that I did, in fact, take the wrong tree at some point. I select the links for the Free edition, complete YAUIR and wait for the email with download instructions. Expecting a quick email response (and not getting one) I review my server logs - the incoming message(s) from VirtualIron with the Free version download information are somewhat SPAMMY - they contain excessive CSS/HTML and are actually being delivered from a third party - I suggest that VirtualIron consider using all-text for these emails…)
The email explains that:
- the single server (free) version boots and runs from USB flash drive
- a review of supported hardware and OS version is encouraged
- you have to download a deployment utility (Windows XP or other, experimental? options) to create the boot media for this solution…
At first this does not appeal to me and then I reconsider what might provide:
- use a small compact flash drive (I have a number of them)
- change my BIOS to boot from this drive (should work)
- this begins to sound interesting (disabling the solution will be simple - change the BIOS and/or remove the CF card…)
- note that while it would most likely be much slower, you should be able to install such an image on a CD/DVD as well
I proceed with the download on my VirtualBox XP VM - ~105MB… After the download completes I copy the file to my real XP box and run the installer (with hopes that I can use a CF card.) I install the software on a drive with adequate space (~300MB needed.) I note a message about write to a USB stick… I start the VirtualIronUSBWriter and provide the necessary information:
- a 2 GB (or larger) USB drive (I just happen to have a 2GB compact flash drive…)
- I choose an image (the default, VirtualIronEVM4413.sub) and
- select ‘write Image to USB drive’ now I wait (just a minute or two)
- the write completes and I am prompted to remove the USB drive and then I exit the program
Ok - now for the real testing - Before I review the documentation I just need to test-boot from the CF card Image. I will try this on my XP hardware first using the 2GB CF card (I also try this with a 1GB CF card which, upon completion shows about 64MB free; my guess is that you might be able to try this with a 512MB card or even burn the image to CD/DVD and avoid having to change your BIOS - I’m also guessing that you could just create a fixed disk partition and install the image to that as well - we’ll see…)
Goodness! On reboot I almost instantly get the boot menu with options for:
- Single Server Edition
- Single Server Edition (debug)
- Single Server Edition (alternate hardware)
- Reset to defaults
I select the first option and, Ahhhh DARN! My XP box is NOT a 64 bit machine - a message is presented that this hardware simply won’t do - so time to move to the AMD Quad core box - after reviewing the docs… which I decide to put off (but I now know that this might be workable from a CF card.)
Ok, rebooting the Quad core - hmm, won’t auto-boot from CF card auto-magically (even after BIOS change) - so I manually set it as the boot device, and voila! I am running the boot menu for VirtualIron Single Server. The setup proceeds:
- the boot image un-compresses fairly quickly
- then a ‘wait for devices’
- set date/time
- set eth0 (Uh Oh! - it does note ’see’ my on-board Giga-Nic - same problem as Xen under Fedora 8…)
- I select DHCP options for my second NIC (which VirtualIron sees as eth0)
- I set an admin user/password
- now attempting to boot (the network should fail since it is not connected at this time…)
- Loading Virtual Iron backend drivers… waiting… waiting…
At this point I speculate that the VirtualIron boot process will fail if DHCP fails (i.e. things will just hang) so I reboot (standard CTRL+ALT+DEL) and this time I will assign a static IP address when prompted.
Hmm - seems that the initial setup has ’stuck’ so I will have to re-configure so I reboot and select the ‘alternate hardware’ option. No luck - still stuck at ‘Loading Virtual Iron backend drivers’… Ok, I’ll let it run while I take a break… Fifteen minutes have passed and the same message is on the screen. I reboot and select ‘Debug Mode’; the boot process proceeds and I see standard Linux-type boot messages and my ‘hang’ seems to be immediately after the SCSI (CF card) device is read… I reboot again and select Reset to factory defaults - thinking that this will allow me to manually configure the network.
On reboot, I set manual IP, netmask and gateway information and the startup/boot completes by presenting a message telling me to connect to the IP address of this system.
Status - for me, unless I am missing some basic bit of information, VirtualIron Single Server is a non-solution at this time - for two reasons:
- My Quad-core box cannot be reached since the Giga-bit, on-board NIC is not supported (this is really a Xen version issue - there might be support down the road.)
- My Quad core box is my only 64 bit system so I am not willing to dedicate it to VirtualIron.
So, now I will review the VirtualIron Single Server documentation (typical disruptive user - experiment first, then read…) before I abandon this exploration. I may try running VirtualIron under VirtualBox - at a later date…
Some notes - disk layouts on my 1GB CF card follow - noting this information I should be able to allocate a disk partition, replicate the CF disk contents on the partition and then boot this environment under Qemu (or VirtualBox or perhaps VMware.)
Output from the mount command (note Fedora 9 auto-mounted the CF card partitions when I inserted the card.):
/dev/sdc3 on /media/disk type ext3 (rw,nosuid,nodev,uhelper=hal)
/dev/sdc2 on /media/disk-1 type vfat (rw,nosuid,nodev,uhelper=hal,shortname=lower,uid=500)
/dev/sdc1 on /media/disk-2 type vfat (rw,nosuid,nodev,uhelper=hal,shortname=lower,uid=500)
Output from fdisk -l /dev/sdc (two DOS partitions, one small ext3 partition and ~600MB free…)
Disk /dev/sdc: 1024 MB, 1024450560 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 124 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x00000000
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdc1 * 1 21 168651 6 FAT16
/dev/sdc2 22 42 168682+ 6 FAT16
/dev/sdc3 43 46 32130 83 Linux
Replicating the CF disk to a newly 1GB created disk partition is simple using the venerable dd command:
dd if=/dev/sdc of=sdc.img
The above command copies the entire contents of the CF card (/dev/sdc) to a file on disk. Just a few more minutes and I can try this under VirtulBox, so…
VBoxManage convertdd -static ./sdc.img CF_Disk.vdi
The above (VirtualBox) command migrates a complete disk image from raw-disk-file to a VirtualBox VDI (virtual disk image) format (note that you will be waiting if the disk partition is large…) Using the VirtualBox Disk Manager, this image is brought in and made available. Finally, a new VM is created and this VDI is assigned as it’s disk. For this VM to boot you must ‘Enable Vt-x/AMD-v’ under the Settings–> Advanced tab. I was able to try the boot menu options, however, the VM fails during the boot process (looks like it attempts to take control of the CPU…)
At this point I note that I need to complete some reading/research and then, perhaps return to explore working with VirtualIron.
