Re: [RFC PATCH 29/35] Add the Xen virtual console driver.

[Anthony Liguori <aliguori@us.ibm.com>]

Keir Fraser wrote:
> On 22 Mar 2006, at 16:00, Anthony Liguori wrote:
>
> > This has always seemed a bit wrong to me and makes a number of things 
> > kind of awkward (like a virtual video driver).
> >
> > It would seem better me to treat this driver as what it really is, a 
> > virtual serial device.  It adds a little bit of additional work to 
> > the userspace tools (they just have to make sure to pass 
> > console=ttyS0) but it seems worth it.
>
> That already works pretty much (userspace tools have to pass 
> xencons=ttyS as well as console=ttyS0).
> > We could also solve the tty[0-9] problem by implementing a proper 
> > console driver that could use multiple virtual serial devices if we 
> > wanted to go that route.
>
> Yes, that could live alongside this driver.

This is going to come up in the next release if we try to merge the 
framebuffer stuff.

> > Another option would be to just emulate a serial driver.  The console 
> > driver isn't really performance critical.  It seems to me that it's a 
> > bit unnecessary to even bother paravirtualizing the console device 
> > when it's so easy to emulate.
>
> Easy except that Xen can't implement the 'console backend', or at 
> least not easily. The console bits need to end up in management 
> virtual machine's user space. We'd have to do something skanky like 
> the current HVM qemu model.

We could make an exception for console devices and just have a small 
buffer in the hypervisor for console input/output (similar to the 
emergency console).  The biggest advantage to doing this IMHO is that it 
makes guest OS's a bit easier to port.  The console already is treated 
as an exception since it is setup in start_info (instead of through 
XenBus) so this is not that awful I think.

Regards,

Anthony Liguori

>  -- Keir

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