Hi The issue probably worth mentioning is how to access running VMs /w KVM. If administrator is using a Linux workstation then virt-manager works fine, but it's less convenient from Windows or MacOS. While X-Window can be installed on both OSs I find it difficult to use virt-manager on Mac OS b/c of keyboard mapping. So far the best way that works for me is to either use local VM with Fedora & virt-manager or run vncviwer from KVM-host with X-forwarding and connect to quest VMs.
I've tried https://www.webvirtmgr.net, which seems like a good solution, but so far I'm unsuccessful to get it fully working - the products is being actively developed. Somewhat different approach is to use a private cloud solution (in my case it's OpenNebula with .pm module) to run VCL VMs. This allows you to use web-interface to access and manage running VMs, somewhat similar to vSphere client. Thanks. On Jul 9, 2013, at 13:25 , James A.s. Trimbee <[email protected]> wrote: > I’ve been using KVM with Rhel 6.4 and VCL in a test environment and it has > been completely reliable, as in no crashes or performance degradation thus > far. However, it has not been heavily loaded yet. On a purely subjective note > I’ve been impressed with it – it seems very smooth. I haven’t tried much in > the way of image conversion. I did find getting to grips with > virt-install/virt-manager/virsh/qemu etc rather confusing at first but it > becomes much clearer with use. > > VCL has had no issues with a lot of configuration changes on the Host (I’ve > completely changed the VM working directory a couple of times), as long as > the ‘VM Host Profiles’ information is correct it copes with it just fine. > > From: Dmitri Chebotarov [mailto:[email protected]] > Sent: Monday, July 08, 2013 4:15 PM > To: [email protected] > Subject: RE: VMware vs. KVM on VCL > > Hi Mike > > I've been using VMWARE and KVM in the same VCL environment for little over a > month. > > While VCL can convert from VMDK to QCOW2 I choose to have dedicated KVM > images in qcow2 format. The main reason for it is to have virtio drivers > installed in VM for better OS performance. Also I couldn't get the > KVM->VMWARE conversion to work - qemu-img creates image which ESXi doesn't > recognize. > > I'm using RedHat 6.3/4 as KVM host OS. Also tried CentOS 6.3/4 before. This > could be related to hardware I have (IBM HS22 blades), but RedHat runs better > in my case. I've experienced unexpected reboots with CentOS. I haven't tried > Fedora in production. > > KVM works very well so far. Looks like it creates/loads VMs faster on the > same hardware/storage compared to ESXi 4.1. I haven't had any KVM related > issues with VCL. > > I hope it helps. > > Thanks. > > From: Waldron, Michael H [[email protected]] > Sent: Monday, July 08, 2013 3:31 PM > To: [email protected] > Subject: VMware vs. KVM on VCL > > I'm curious to hear about people's experiences/opinions with VMware and KVM > on VCL. Up to this point, we have been using the free version of VMware ESXi, > but I've done some testing with KVM, and it seems to work well also. > > It looks like the two will co-exist well, as KVM successfully converts the > vmdk images to qcow2 format on the fly, and will even convert new images > created on KVM back to vmdk format if the repository is defined as vmdk > format. > > So I'm toying with the idea of migrating away from VMware and going to KVM, > and wanted to hear about others experiences if they've done the same, or can > compare performance between the two hypervisors. Also, if you are using KVM, > what OS are you running it on. The testing I did was with KVM running on > Fedora 16. > > Thanks, > Mike > > > Mike Waldron > Systems Specialist > ITS - Research Computing Center > University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill > -- Thank you, Dmitri Chebotarov VCL Sys Eng, Engineering & Architectural Support, TSD - Ent Servers & Messaging 223 Aquia Building, Ffx, MSN: 1B5 Phone: (703) 993-6175 | Fax: (703) 993-3404
