DESCRIPTION

The -v option enables verbose mode. Within the commands, the size argument can be specified with a human-readable scale, using the format described in scan_scaled(3). The id argument can be either a numeric, non-zero identifier or alternatively the name of a virtual machine.

The name argument can only consist of alphanumeric characters, as well as '.', '-', and '_', and must start with a letter.

The disk argument is used by commands that take a path to a disk image file. It may be prefixed with a format prefix (raw:disk or qcow2:disk) in order to specify the disk image format. If left unspecified, the format defaults to ‘raw’ if it cannot be derived automatically.

The commands are as follows:

console id

Using cu(1) connect to the console of the VM with the specified id.

create disk [-b base | -i disk] [-s size]

Create a VM disk image file with the specified disk path.

-b base

For ‘qcow2’, a base image may be specified. The base image is not modified and the derived image contains only the changes written by the VM.

-i disk

Copy and convert the input disk to the newly created disk. This option conflicts with -b base.

-s size

Specify the size of the new disk image, rounded to megabytes. If the -b option is specified, the size must match the size of the base image. For the -i option, the size cannot be smaller than the input disk size. The size can be ommitted with the -b and -i options and will be obtained from the base or input image respectively.

load filename

Load additional configuration from the specified file.

log brief | verbose

Disable or enable verbose debug logging.

pause id

Pause a VM with the specified id.

receive name

Receive a VM from standard input and start it with the specified name.

reload

Remove all stopped VMs and reload the configuration from the default configuration file.

reset [all | switches | vms]

Reset the running state, reset switches, or reset and terminate all vms.

send id

Send a VM with the specified id to standard output and terminate it. The VM is paused during send processing. Data sent to standard output contains the VM parameters and its memory, not the disk image.

In order to move a VM from one host to another, disk files must be synced between the send and the receive processes and must be located under the same path.

show [id]

An alias for the status command.

start id | name [-cL] [-B device] [-b path] [-d disk] [-i count] [-m size] [-n switch] [-r path] [-t name]

Start a new VM name with the specified parameters. An existing VM may be started by referencing its id.

-B device

Force system to boot from the specified device for this boot. device can be set to:

cdrom

Boot the CD-ROM image.

disk

Boot from disk.

net

Perform a PXE boot using the first network interface.

Currently net is only supported when booting a kernel using the -b flag while disk and cdrom only work with BIOS images.

-b path

Boot the VM with the specified kernel or BIOS image. If not specified, the default is to boot using the BIOS image in /etc/firmware/vmm-bios.

-c

Automatically connect to the VM console.

-d disk

Use a disk image at the specified disk path (may be specified multiple times to add multiple disk images).

-i count

Number of network interfaces to add to the VM.

-L

Add a local network interface. vmd(8) will auto-generate an IPv4 subnet for the interface, configure a gateway address on the VM host side, and run a simple DHCP/BOOTP server for the VM. See LOCAL INTERFACES below for more information on how addresses are calculated and assigned when using the -L option.

-m size

Memory size of the VM, rounded to megabytes. The default is 512M.

-n switch

Add a network interface that is attached to the specified virtual switch. See SWITCH CONFIGURATION in vm.conf(5) for more information.

-r path

ISO image file for virtual CD-ROM. This image file will be available in the selected VM as a SCSI CD-ROM device attached to a virtio SCSI adapter (e.g. vioscsi(4)).

-t name

Use an existing VM with the specified name as a template to create a new VM instance. The instance will inherit settings from the parent VM, except for exclusive options such as disk, interface lladdr, or interface names.

status [id]

List VMs running on the host, optionally listing just the selected VM id.

stop [id | -a] [-fw]

Stop (terminate) a VM defined by the specified VM id or all running VMs (-a). By default, a graceful shutdown will be attempted if the VM supports the vmmci(4) device. Once stopped, if the VM was not defined in a configuration file, then it is removed.

The following options can be specified when stopping a VM:

-f

Forcefully stop the VM without attempting a graceful shutdown.

-w

Wait until the VM has been terminated.

unpause id

Unpause (resume from a paused state) a VM with the specified id.

wait id

Wait until the specified VM has stopped.

If the -i option is specified during VM startup, a corresponding number of host-side tap(4) interfaces will be allocated and mapped to the vio(4) interfaces inside the guest VM. This tap/vio interface mapping allows guest network traffic to be manipulated by the host. Any valid host-side interface configuration may be performed on these tap interfaces, such as bridging (via bridge(4)), or using pf(4) nat-to rules to create private or host-side NATed networks, as desired.

pass out on $ext_if from 100.64.0.0/10 to any nat-to $ext_if

pass in proto { udp tcp } from 100.64.0.0/10 to any port domain \
      rdr-to $dns_server port domain

$ vmctl create disk.img -s 4.5G

$ vmctl create disk.qcow2 -i disk.img

# vmctl start "myvm" -m 1G -i 1 -b /bsd -d disk.img

# vmctl start "myvm" -t "openbsd.4G" -d mydisk.img

# ifconfig tap0
tap0: flags=8842<BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> mtu 1500
	lladdr fe:e1:ba:d8:50:d1
	description: vm1-if0-myvm
	index 15 priority 0 llprio 3
	groups: tap
	status: active

# vmctl stop 1