Storage pools
Storage pools and volumes are not required for the proper operation of guest virtual machines.
Pools and volumes provide a way for libvirt to ensure that a particular piece of storage will be available for a guest virtual machine, but some administrators will prefer to manage their own storage and guest virtual machines will operate properly without any pools or volumes defined.
NFS storage pool
Suppose a storage administrator responsible for an NFS server creates a share to store guest virtual machines' data. T he system administrator defines a pool on the host physical machine with the details of the share (nfs.example.com:/path/to/share should be mounted on /vm _data). When
the pool is started, libvirt mounts the share on the specified directory, just as if the system administrator logged in and executed m ount nfs.exam ple.com :/path/to/share /vm data. If the pool is configured to autostart, libvirt ensures that the NFS share is mounted on the directory specified when libvirt is started.
Once the pool starts, the files that the NFS share, are reported as volumes, and the storage volumes' paths are then queried using the libvirt APIs. T he volumes' paths can then be copied into the section of a guest virtual machine's XML definition file describing the source storage for the guest virtual machine's block devices. With NFS, applications using the libvirt APIs can create and delete volumes in the pool (files within the NFS share) up to the limit of the size of the pool (the maximum storage capacity of the share).
Pools and volumes provide a way for libvirt to ensure that a particular piece of storage will be available for a guest virtual machine, but some administrators will prefer to manage their own storage and guest virtual machines will operate properly without any pools or volumes defined.
NFS storage pool
Suppose a storage administrator responsible for an NFS server creates a share to store guest virtual machines' data. T he system administrator defines a pool on the host physical machine with the details of the share (nfs.example.com:/path/to/share should be mounted on /vm _data). When
the pool is started, libvirt mounts the share on the specified directory, just as if the system administrator logged in and executed m ount nfs.exam ple.com :/path/to/share /vm data. If the pool is configured to autostart, libvirt ensures that the NFS share is mounted on the directory specified when libvirt is started.
Once the pool starts, the files that the NFS share, are reported as volumes, and the storage volumes' paths are then queried using the libvirt APIs. T he volumes' paths can then be copied into the section of a guest virtual machine's XML definition file describing the source storage for the guest virtual machine's block devices. With NFS, applications using the libvirt APIs can create and delete volumes in the pool (files within the NFS share) up to the limit of the size of the pool (the maximum storage capacity of the share).
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