1##################################
2__ __ _ _ _ ___
3\ \/ /___ _ __ | || | / |/ _ \
4 \ // _ \ '_ \ | || |_ | | (_) |
5 / \ __/ | | | |__ _|| |\__, |
6/_/\_\___|_| |_| |_|(_)_| /_/
7
8##################################
9
10https://www.xen.org/
11
12What is Xen?
13============
14
15Xen is a Virtual Machine Monitor (VMM) originally developed by the
16Systems Research Group of the University of Cambridge Computer
17Laboratory, as part of the UK-EPSRC funded XenoServers project. Xen
18is freely-distributable Open Source software, released under the GNU
19GPL. Since its initial public release, Xen has grown a large
20development community, spearheaded by xen.org (https://www.xen.org).
21
22This file contains some quick-start instructions to install Xen on
23your system. For more information see https://www.xen.org/ and
24https://wiki.xen.org/
25
26Quick-Start Guide
27=================
28
29First, this is just a quick-start guide. For more comprehensive
30information see the INSTALL file and the Xen wiki at
31https://wiki.xenproject.org and in particular
32https://wiki.xenproject.org/wiki/Getting_Started.
33
34Second, there are a number of prerequisites for building a Xen source
35release. Make sure you have all the following installed, either by
36visiting the project webpage or installing a pre-built package
37provided by your OS distributor:
38 * GNU Make v3.80 or later
39 * C compiler and linker:
40 - For x86:
41 - GCC 4.1.2_20070115 or later
42 - GNU Binutils 2.16.91.0.5 or later
43 or
44 - Clang/LLVM 3.5 or later
45 - For ARM 32-bit:
46 - GCC 4.9 or later
47 - GNU Binutils 2.24 or later
48 - For ARM 64-bit:
49 - GCC 5.1 or later
50 - GNU Binutils 2.24 or later
51 * POSIX compatible awk
52 * Development install of zlib (e.g., zlib-dev)
53 * Development install of Python 2.7 or later (e.g., python-dev)
54 * Development install of curses (e.g., libncurses-dev)
55 * Development install of uuid (e.g. uuid-dev)
56 * Development install of yajl (e.g. libyajl-dev)
57 * Development install of libaio (e.g. libaio-dev) version 0.3.107 or
58 greater.
59 * Development install of GLib v2.0 (e.g. libglib2.0-dev)
60 * Development install of Pixman (e.g. libpixman-1-dev)
61 * pkg-config
62 * bridge-utils package (/sbin/brctl)
63 * iproute package (/sbin/ip)
64 * GNU bison and GNU flex
65 * ACPI ASL compiler (iasl)
66
67In addition to the above there are a number of optional build
68prerequisites. Omitting these will cause the related features to be
69disabled at compile time:
70 * Binary-search capable grep (if building Xen with CET support)
71 * Development install of Ocaml (e.g. ocaml-nox and
72 ocaml-findlib). Required to build ocaml components which
73 includes the alternative ocaml xenstored.
74 * cmake (if building vtpm stub domains)
75 * pandoc, transfig, pod2{man,html,text} for rendering various pieces of
76 documentation into alternative formats
77 * figlet (for generating the traditional Xen start of day banner)
78 * systemd daemon development files
79 * Development install of libnl3 (e.g., libnl-3-200,
80 libnl-3-dev, etc). Required if network buffering is desired
81 when using Remus with libxl. See docs/README.remus for detailed
82 information.
83 * 16-bit x86 assembler, loader and compiler for qemu-traditional / rombios
84 (dev86 rpm or bin86 & bcc debs)
85 * Development install of liblzma for rombios
86 * Development install of libbz2, liblzma, liblzo2, and libzstd for DomU
87 kernel decompression.
88
89Second, you need to acquire a suitable kernel for use in domain 0. If
90possible you should use a kernel provided by your OS distributor. If
91no suitable kernel is available from your OS distributor then refer to
92https://wiki.xen.org/wiki/XenDom0Kernels for suggestions for
93suitable kernels to use.
94If you are looking to compile a Dom0 kernel from source, please refer to
95https://wiki.xen.org/wiki/XenParavirtOps.
96
97[NB. Unless noted otherwise, all the following steps should be
98performed with root privileges.]
99
1001. Download and untar the source tarball file. This will be a
101 file named xen-unstable-src.tgz, or xen-$version-src.tgz.
102 You can also pull the current version from the git or mercurial
103 repositories at https://xenbits.xen.org/
104
105 # tar xzf xen-unstable-src.tgz
106
107 Assuming you are using the unstable tree, this will
108 untar into xen-unstable. The rest of the instructions
109 use the unstable tree as an example, substitute the
110 version for unstable.
111
1122. cd to xen-unstable (or whatever you sensibly rename it to).
113
1143. For the very first build, or if you want to destroy build trees,
115 perform the following steps:
116
117 # ./configure
118 # make world
119 # make install
120
121 See the documentation in the INSTALL file for more info.
122
123 This will create and install onto the local machine. It will build
124 the xen binary (xen.gz), the tools and the documentation.
125
126 You can override the destination for make install by setting DESTDIR
127 to some value.
128
1294. To rebuild an existing tree without modifying the config:
130 # make dist
131
132 This will build and install xen, tools, and docs into the local dist/
133 directory.
134
135 You can override the destination for make install by setting DISTDIR
136 to some value.
137
138 make install and make dist differ in that make install does the
139 right things for your local machine (installing the appropriate
140 version of udev scripts, for example), but make dist includes all
141 versions of those scripts, so that you can copy the dist directory
142 to another machine and install from that distribution.
143
144xenstore: xenstored and oxenstored
145====================================
146
147Xen uses a configuration database called xenstore [0] to maintain configuration
148and status information shared between domains. A daemon is implemented as part
149of xenstore to act as an interface for access to the database for dom0 and
150guests. Two xenstored daemons are supported, one written in C which we refer
151to as the xenstored (sometimes referred to as cxenstored), and another written
152in Ocaml called oxenstored. Details for xenstore and the different
153implementations can be found on the wiki's xenstore reference guide [1] and
154the xenstored [2] page. You can choose which xenstore you want to enable as
155default on a system through configure:
156
157 ./configure --with-xenstored=xenstored
158 ./configure --with-xenstored=oxenstored
159
160By default oxenstored will be used if the ocaml development tools are found.
161If you enable oxenstored the xenstored will still be built and installed,
162the xenstored used can be changed through the configuration file:
163
164/etc/sysconfig/xencommons
165or
166/etc/default/xencommons
167
168You can change the preferred xenstored you want to use in the configuration
169but since we cannot stop the daemon a reboot will be required to make the
170change take effect.
171
172[0] https://wiki.xen.org/wiki/XenStore
173[1] https://wiki.xen.org/wiki/XenStoreReference
174[2] https://wiki.xen.org/wiki/Xenstored
175
176Python Runtime Libraries
177========================
178
179Various tools, such as pygrub, have the following runtime dependencies:
180
181 * Python 2.7 or later.
182 URL: https://www.python.org/
183 Debian: python
184
185Intel(R) Trusted Execution Technology Support
186=============================================
187
188Intel's technology for safer computing, Intel(R) Trusted Execution Technology
189(Intel(R) TXT), defines platform-level enhancements that provide the building
190blocks for creating trusted platforms. For more information, see
191https://www.intel.com/technology/security/.
192
193Intel(R) TXT support is provided by the Trusted Boot (tboot) module in
194conjunction with minimal logic in the Xen hypervisor.
195
196Tboot is an open source, pre- kernel/VMM module that uses Intel(R) TXT to
197perform a measured and verified launch of an OS kernel/VMM.
198
199The Trusted Boot module is available from
200http://sourceforge.net/projects/tboot. This project hosts the code in a
201mercurial repo at http://tboot.sourceforge.net/hg/tboot.hg and contains
202tarballs of the source. Instructions in the tboot README describe how
203to modify grub.conf to use tboot to launch Xen.
204