this post was submitted on 17 Apr 2024
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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).

Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.

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[–] [email protected] 44 points 6 months ago (4 children)

Let me add one more voice to say, why oh why would you do that to yourself and suffer subpar virtualization when you have world class type 1 virtualization built straight into the kernel. And an incredibly capable UI, around since 2009, in the form of virt-manager?

[–] [email protected] 10 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

and suffer subpar virtualization

Meh I can get a Win11 guest that interacts well and conveniently with the host and its peripherals and if all I'm doing is running tax software, office365 or compile my Rust app to test it cross platform - vbox is perfectly fine. I'm not running anything demanding.

I'm not taking a stance against KVM it's great, but rather saying that for some of us it's not that big of an issue which solution to use, it just needs to be convenient.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

But like... why? It's not even more convenient, virt-manager is literally zero setup (in Debian at least) and you don't need to deal with DKMS.

The kvm-guest-agent tool and some virtio drivers even exist for winblows.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 months ago (1 children)

When I run virt-manager on Bookworm, all it does is tell me that "xen is not connected". There is nothing to indicate that KVM is anything that virt-manager might support, or why it currently doesn't.

The best I can do is to make a VM in gnome boxes, use "ps" to capture its command line to qemu, re-format that into something that I can put into a bash script, and edit in additional options that Boxes/libvirt absolutely refuse to support.

Most of the host integration features are better in Virtualbox. On the other hand, with qemu I don't have to look at VB filling the journal with ubsan errors (and wonder if its crappy driver is corrupting shit). If VB supported KVM, I would go right back to it.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (1 children)

You just need to add a KVM connection.

File > Add connection > select "QEMU/KVM" > Profit

Most of the host integration features are better in Virtualbox.

Highly doubt that, specially if you're using Virtio devices and the qemu guest agents.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 months ago (2 children)

Aha, thank you! That's just a weird enough concept to "attach to" a local QEMU user session (where virt-manager will be the guy spinning it off anyway) that I would never have seen it.

Every newbie article about virt-manager starts with a filled list of connections, so I was down to figuring that it's cleverly detecting a missing dependency or permission and silently eliminating list entries for me.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Glad it helped! The idea is that virt-manager is semi backend agnostic. It'll doe Xen, Qemu, and LXC via libvirt, and it can do those as root, or unprivileged as well as connect to remote sessions via ssh. Pretty darn cool!

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago

Don't you hate it when a newbie how-to doesn't start from where a newbie will, with a fresh install and nothing configured and no prior knowledge?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Tried for days to get a windows 11 guest to work on KVM with virt manager. Couldn't get very good performance at all. Virtual box with guest drivers is pretty close to bare metal for me. I'd love to use KVM but can't get good performance