Today I bought a new hard disk, and tried to install xen on it.

Install Base ArchLinux

1. Start computer with USB key, choose x86_64, NBD;

2. This is not UEFI boot: an error raised when efivar -l;

3. Install system:

   rmmod tg3

   modprobe broadcom

   modprobe tg3

   systemctl stop dhcpcd.service

   dhcpcd enp2s0

   sgdisk --zap-all /dev/sda

   cgdisk /dev/sda

   // choose GPT partitions type, /dev/sda1: 50G, /dev/sda2: 300G, 581G free

   mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda1

   mkfs.ext4 /dev/sda2

   mount /dev/sda1 /mnt

   mkdir /mnt/home

   mount /dev/sda2 /mnt/home

   vi /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

   export http_proxy=http://10.32.1.154:8888

   export https_proxy=http://10.32.1.154:8888 // add the ip into "allow" list tinyproxy.conf

   pacstrap -i /mnt base base-devel

   genfstab -U -p /mnt >> /mnt/etc/fstab

   vi /etc/locale.gen

   locale-gen

   echo LANG=en_US.UTF-8 > /etc/locale.conf

   export LANG=en_US.UTF-8

   ln -s /usr/share/zoneinfo/Hongkong /etc/localtime

   hwclock --systohc --utc

   echo xenserver > /etc/hostname

   vi /etc/hosts

   systemctl enable dhcpcd@enp2s0.service

   passwd

   export http_proxy=http://10.32.1.154:8888

   export https_proxy=http://10.32.1.154:8888

   pacman -S openssh

   systemctl enable sshd.service

   pacman -S gptfdisk // use syslinux boot loader for GPT installed previously

   pacman -S syslinux

   syslinux-install_update -iam

   vi /boot/syslinux/syslinux.cfg // modify sda3 to sda1 in "APPEND root=/dev/sda3"

   exit

   reboot

Customize System

After reboot, login as root and run:

# useradd -m chad
# passwd chad
# passwd -l root     // disable root login, use can remove this by `sudo passwd -u root`
# export http_proxy=http://10.32.1.154:8888
# export https_proxy=http://10.32.1.154:8888
# pacman -Syu
# pacman -S xorg-server xorg-server-utils xorg-xinit i3 dmenu xf86-video-intel terminator ttf-dejavu firefox
# su - chad
$ echo exec i3 > ~/.xinitrc
$ startx

Install Xen

First make sure the host can access internet, then enable multilib repository, uncomment following lines in /etc/pacman.conf:

[multilib]
Include = /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

Install yaourt, see note "Yaourt Notes" for details. Then run yaourt -S xen. If failed, install it manually:

Download xen.tar.gz, and run:

tar xf xen.tar.gz
cd xen
makepkg
sudo pacman -U xen-4.4.1-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.xz

Config network:

# cd /etc/netctl
# cp examples/bridge xenbridge-dhcp
# vi xenbridge-dhcp
# netctl start xenbridge-dhcp
# brctl show
# netctl enable xenbridge-dhcp

Config services:

sudo systemctl enable xenstored.service
sudo systemctl enable xenconsoled.service
sudo systemctl enable xendomains.service

Config boot loader. Add following stanza to /boot/syslinux/syslinux.cfg:

LABEL xen
    MENU LABEL Xen
    KERNEL mboot.c32
    APPEND ../xen-4.4.1.gz --- ../vmlinuz-linux console=tty0 root=/dev/sda1 ro --- ../initramfs-linux.img

And make sure there is a "mboot.c32" file in folder /boot/syslinux, or you have to copy it: cp /usr/lib/syslinux/bios/mboot.c32 /boot/syslinux/.

Note: If there is file conflicting errors, use sudo pacman -U --force xen-4.4.1-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.xz to install it.

Reboot, choose "Xen" at boot screen, then run sudo xl list (list all xen domains), you can see a "Domain-0" item. If you boot with ArchLinux, run sudo xl list will report an error.

Install Guest OS on Xen

See Xen Configuration File Options for full syntax of xen domU config files.

CentOS 6.5 minimal

PV

Not succeed yet. Maybe we should use CentOS as dom0 system.

$ mkdir ~/docs/cloud60
$ cd ~/docs/cloud60
$ dd if=/dev/zero of=cloud60.img bs=1M count=10240
$ mkfs.ext4 cloud60.img
$ sudo mount -o loop CentOS-6.5-x86_64-minimal.iso /mnt
$ cat cloud60.conf      // ???
$ sudo xl create -c cloud60.conf

HVM

$ sudo pacman -S mesa-libgl bluez-libs tigervnc
$ mkdir ~/docs/cloud60
$ cd ~/docs/cloud60
$ dd if=/dev/zero of=cloud60.img bs=1M count=10240
$ mkfs.ext4 cloud60.img
$ sudo mount -o loop CentOS-6.5-x86_64-minimal.iso /mnt
$ cat cloud60.conf
name = "hvmcentos"
builder = "hvm"
memory = 1024
disk = [ "file:/home/chad/docs/cloud60/cloud60.img,xvda,w", "file:/home/chad/warez/CentOS-6.5-x86_64-minimal.iso,xvdb:cdrom,r" ]
vif = ["bridge=xenbr0"]
vnc = 1
vnclisten = "0.0.0.0"
vncdisplay = 1

$ sudo xl create cloud60.conf
$ sudo xl vncviewer hvmcentos

Or you can use vncviewer localhost:5901 to connect to the guest OS, here the "1" in "5901" is determined by the value of "vncdisplay" in guest OS config file. After connecting to the guest OS, install system, then reboot and connect it with vncviewer again. You can use xl's subcommands "list", "top" and "info" to probe domU systems.

Using Xen

Based on Xen on Arch Wiki.

Use Debian as dom0: Xen Project Beginners Guide;

Use CentOS as dom0: Xen4 CentOS6 QuickStart;

Use Ubuntu as dom0: Xen in Ubuntu Community;

Other patterns see Guest Install;