Subject: Re: NetBSD and Xen 2.0
To: tls@rek.tjls.com, Manuel Bouyer <bouyer@antioche.eu.org>
From: Christian Limpach <chris@pin.lu>
List: port-xen
Date: 12/14/2004 02:59:44
> > I'm *very* interested in this, and have time to work on it.
> > After reading the Xen interface manual here is a summary of what I think
needs
> > to be done (but I didn't look at any code yet):
> > - get a pseudo ethernet device in tree (maybe cube's ethfoo device,
modified
> >   so that it can be compiled in a static kernel), similar to tun(4) but
with
> >   ethernet semantics. This is interesting for other reasons, for example
to
> >   build a virtual lan across an internet link, in a ssh, ipsec or other
> >   kind of securised transport tool. It would also be good for softwares
> >   such as simh: simh currently use /dev/bpf to talk to network, but this
has
> >   some limitation, and one annoying bug (simh can't talk to his host
though
> >   network). Using such a device instead would allow to build a vitual
ethernet
> >   network between simh and its host, and then bridge, NAT, or route it
with
> >   the real network device. I guess vmware could use it too.
>
> Isn't one of the vmware compat modules that Frank did such an interface?
> Maybe it would be possible to reuse it.
>
> > Did I forget some steps, or missed some important details ?
>
> I think you hit them all.  Chris?

yes, except I'm not quite sure why you need the pseudo ethernet device in
this context?

The privileged domain console access might also need some tweaking.

I'll try to remember what else needed changing when I added dom0 support to
Linux 2.6 -- but getting the PCI stuff working is the most important.

And please always include the RCS Id reference if you're copying an
arch/i386 file to arch/xen, so we can track what updates need to be merged.

     christian