virt-what

Langue: en

Version: 2009-12-17 (ubuntu - 24/10/10)

Section: 1 (Commandes utilisateur)

NAME

virt-what - detect if we are running in a virtual machine

SUMMARY

virt-what [options]

DESCRIPTION

"virt-what" is a shell script which can be used to detect if the program is running in a virtual machine.

The program prints out a list of ``facts'' about the virtual machine, derived from heuristics. One fact is printed per line.

If nothing is printed and the script exits with code 0 (no error), then it can mean either that the program is running on bare-metal or the program is running inside a type of virtual machine which we don't know about or cannot detect.

FACTS

openvz
The guest appears to be running inside an OpenVZ or Virtuozzo container.

Status: contributed by Evgeniy Sokolov

kvm
This is KVM.

Status: confirmed by RWMJ.

qemu
This is QEMU.

Status: confirmed by RWMJ.

uml
This is a User-Mode Linux (UML) guest.

Status: contributed by Laurent Leonard

virtualbox
This is a VirtualBox guest.

Status: contributed by Laurent Leonard

virtualpc
The guest appears to be running on Microsoft VirtualPC.

Status: not confirmed

vmware
The guest appears to be running on VMware.

Status: confirmed by RWMJ

xen
The guest appears to be running on Xen.

Status: confirmed by RWMJ

xen-dom0
This is the Xen dom0 (privileged domain).

Status: confirmed by RWMJ

xen-domU
This is a Xen domU (paravirtualized guest domain).

Status: confirmed by RWMJ

xen-hvm
This is a Xen guest fully virtualized (HVM).

Status: confirmed by RWMJ

IMPORTANT NOTE

Most of the time, using this program is the wrong thing to do. Instead you should detect the specific features you actually want to use. (As an example, if you wanted to issue Xen hypervisor commands you would look for the "/proc/xen/privcmd" file).

However people keep asking for this, so we provide it. There are a few legitimate uses:

Bug reporting tool
If you think that virtualization could affect how your program runs, then you might use "virt-what" to report this in a bug reporting tool.
Status display and monitoring tools
You might include this information in status and monitoring programs.

SEE ALSO

<http://www.libvirt.org/>, <http://et.redhat.com/~rjones/>, <http://www.vmware.com/>, <http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/winfamily/virtualpc>, <http://xensource.com/>, <http://bellard.org/qemu/>, <http://kvm.qumranet.com/>, <http://openvz.org/>

AUTHORS

Richard W.M. Jones <rjones @ redhat . com> (C) Copyright 2008 Red Hat Inc., <http://libvirt.org/>

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.

REPORTING BUGS

Bugs can be viewed on the Red Hat Bugzilla page: <https://bugzilla.redhat.com/>.

If you find a bug in virt-what, please follow these steps to report it:

1. Check for existing bug reports
Go to <https://bugzilla.redhat.com/> and search for similar bugs. Someone may already have reported the same bug, and they may even have fixed it.
2. Capture debug and error messages
Run
  virt-what > virt-what.log 2>&1
 
 

and keep virt-what.log. It may contain error messages which you should submit with your bug report.

3. Get version of virt-what and version of libvirt.
Run
  virt-what --version
 
 
4. Submit a bug report.
Go to <https://bugzilla.redhat.com/> and enter a new bug. Please describe the problem in as much detail as possible.

Remember to include the version numbers (step 3) and the debug messages file (step 2).

5. Assign the bug to rjones @ redhat.com
Assign or reassign the bug to rjones @ redhat.com (without the spaces). You can also send me an email with the bug number if you want a faster response.