Provided by: xen-utils-common_4.17.3+10-g091466ba55-1.1ubuntu3_amd64 
NAME
xl-disk-configuration - XL Disk Configuration Syntax
SYNTAX
This document specifies the xl config file format disk configuration option. It has the following form:
disk = [ 'DISKSPEC', 'DISKSPEC', ... ]
where each "DISKSPEC" is in this form:
[<key>=<value>|<flag>,]*,
[<target>, [<format>, [<vdev>, [<access>]]]],
[<key>=<value>|<flag>,]*
[target=<target>]
For example, these strings are equivalent:
/dev/vg/guest-volume,,hda
/dev/vg/guest-volume,raw,hda,rw
format=raw, vdev=hda, access=rw, target=/dev/vg/guest-volume
raw:/dev/vg/guest-volume,hda,w (deprecated, see below)
As are these:
/root/image.iso,,hdc,cdrom
/root/image.iso,,hdc,,cdrom
/root/image.iso,raw,hdc,devtype=cdrom
format=raw, vdev=hdc, access=ro, devtype=cdrom, target=/root/image.iso
raw:/root/image.iso,hdc:cdrom,ro (deprecated, see below)
These might be specified in the domain config file like this:
disk = [ '/dev/vg/guest-volume,,hda', '/root/image.iso,,hdc,cdrom' ]
More formally, the string is a series of comma-separated keyword/value pairs, flags and positional
parameters. Parameters which are not bare keywords and which do not contain "=" symbols are assigned to
the so-far-unspecified positional parameters, in the order below. The positional parameters may also be
specified explicitly by name.
Each parameter may be specified at most once, either as a positional parameter or a named parameter.
Default values apply if the parameter is not specified, or if it is specified with an empty value
(whether positionally or explicitly).
Whitespace may appear before each parameter and will be ignored.
Positional Parameters
target
Description
Block device or image file path. When this is used as a path, /dev will be prepended if the path
doesn't start with a '/'.
Supported values
N/A
Deprecated values
N/A
Default value
None. While a path is provided in most cases there is an exception: for a cdrom device, lack of
this attribute would imply an empty cdrom drive.
Special syntax
When this parameter is specified by name, ie with the "target=" syntax in the configuration file,
it consumes the whole rest of the "DISKSPEC" including trailing whitespaces. Therefore in that
case it must come last. This is permissible even if an empty value for the target was already
specified as a positional parameter. This is the only way to specify a target string containing
metacharacters such as commas and (in some cases) colons, which would otherwise be
misinterpreted.
Future parameter and flag names will start with an ascii letter and contain only ascii
alphanumerics, hyphens and underscores, and will not be legal as vdevs. Targets which might
match that syntax should not be specified as positional parameters.
format
Description
Specifies the format of image file.
Supported values
raw, qcow, qcow2, vhd, qed
Deprecated values
None
Default value
raw
vdev
Description
Virtual device as seen by the guest (also referred to as guest drive designation in some
specifications). See xen-vbd-interface(7).
Supported values
hd[x], xvd[x], sd[x] etc. Please refer to the above specification for further details.
Deprecated values
None
Default Value
None, this parameter is mandatory.
access
Description
Specified access control information. Whether or not the block device is provided to the guest
in read-only or read-write mode depends on this attribute.
Supported values
"ro", "r" (specifies read-only)
"rw", "w" (specifies read/write)
Deprecated values
None
Default value
"rw" unless devtype=cdrom, in which case "r"
Other Parameters And Flags
devtype=DEVTYPE
Description
Qualifies virtual device type.
Supported values
cdrom
Deprecated values
None
Mandatory
No
cdrom
Convenience alias for "devtype=cdrom".
backend=DOMAIN-NAME
Description
Designates a backend domain for the device
Supported values
Valid domain names
Mandatory
No
Specifies the backend domain which this device should attach to. This defaults to domain 0.
Specifying another domain requires setting up a driver domain which is outside the scope of this
document.
backendtype=TYPE
Description
Specifies the backend implementation to use
Supported values
phy, qdisk, standalone
Mandatory
No
Default value
Automatically determine which backend to use.
It controls which software implementation of the backend driver is used. Depending on the
"specification" option this may affect the guest's view of the device.
Not all backend drivers support all combinations of other options. For example, "phy" and
"standalone" do not support formats other than "raw" and "standalone" does not support specifications
other than "virtio". Normally this option should not be specified, in which case libxl will
automatically determine the most suitable backend.
script=SCRIPT
Specifies that target is not a normal host path, but rather information to be interpreted by the
executable program SCRIPT, (looked for in /etc/xen/scripts, if it doesn't contain a slash).
These scripts are normally called "block-SCRIPT".
direct-io-safe
Description
Disables non-O_DIRECT workaround
Supported values
absent, present
Mandatory
No
Default value
absent (workaround may be enabled)
There is a memory lifetime bug in some driver domain (dom0) kernels which can cause crashes when
using O_DIRECT. The bug occurs due to a mismatch between the backend-visible lifetime of pages used
for the Xen PV network protocol and that expected by the backend kernel's networking subsystem. This
can cause crashes when using certain backends with certain underlying storage.
See:
<https://lists.xenproject.org/archives/html/xen-devel/2012-12/msg01154.html>
For this reason, (this version of) the Xen libxl toolstack disables O_DIRECT when using the qemu-
based Xen PV backend ("qdisk").
However, this workaround has performance and scaling implications, and it is only necessary if the
underlying device is a network filesystem. If the underlying device is not, then it is good to
disable it; that is what this option is for.
This option simply requests that the workaround be disabled. (However, not all backends versions
which use the workaround understand this option, so this is on a best effort basis.)
It's important to note that if you are storing the VM disk on a network filesystem or a network block
device (NFS or ISCSI) it might not be safe to use this option. Otherwise specifying it is safe and
can give better performances.
If in the future the bug is fixed properly this option will then be silently ignored.
discard / no-discard
Description
Request that backend advertise discard support to frontend
Supported values
discard, no-discard
Mandatory
No
Default value
discard
An advisory setting for the backend driver, specifying whether to advertise discard support (TRIM,
UNMAP) to the frontend. The real benefit of this option is to be able to force it off rather than
on. It can be used to disable "hole punching" for file based backends which were intentionally
created non-sparse to avoid fragmentation of the file.
trusted / untrusted
Description
Reports whether the backend should be trusted by the frontend
Supported values
trusted, untrusted
Mandatory
No
Default value
trusted
An advisory setting for the frontend driver on whether the backend should be trusted. The frontend
should deploy whatever protections it has available to prevent an untrusted backend from accessing
guest data not related to the I/O processing or causing malfunction to the frontend or the whole
domain.
Note frontends can ignore such recommendation.
specification=SPECIFICATION
Description
Specifies the communication protocol (specification) to use for the chosen "backendtype" option
Supported values
xen, virtio
Mandatory
No
Default value
xen
Besides forcing toolstack to use specific backend implementation, this also affects the guest's view
of the device. For example, "virtio" requires Virtio frontend driver (virtio-blk) to be used. Please
note, the virtual device (vdev) is not passed to the guest in that case, but it still must be
specified for the internal purposes.
COLO Parameters
colo
Enable COLO HA for disk. For better understanding block replication on QEMU, please refer to:
<https://wiki.qemu.org/Features/BlockReplication> Note that the COLO configuration settings should be
considered unstable. They may change incompatibly in future versions of Xen.
colo-host
Description
Secondary host's address
Mandatory
Yes when COLO enabled
colo-port
Description
Secondary port. We will run a nbd server on secondary host, and the nbd server will listen this
port.
Mandatory
Yes when COLO enabled
colo-export
Description
We will run a nbd server on secondary host, exportname is the nbd server's disk export name.
Mandatory
Yes when COLO enabled
active-disk
Description
This is used by secondary. Secondary guest's write will be buffered in this disk.
Mandatory
Yes when COLO enabled
hidden-disk
Description
This is used by secondary. It buffers the original content that is modified by the primary VM.
Mandatory
Yes when COLO enabled
Deprecated Parameters, Prefixes And Syntaxes
Deprecated forms are acceptable and are intended work compatibly with xend and xl from xen 4.1. In
future they may print a warning. Support for deprecated parameters and syntaxes are likely to be dropped
in future versions of xl.
There is support for a deprecated old syntax for "DISKSPEC":
[<format>:][<target>],<vdev>[:<devtype>],<access> (deprecated)
This syntax also supports deprecated prefixes, described below. These are found prepended to the format
parameter - eg "tap:aio:qcow:".
format
Description
Specifies the format (deprecated)
Supported values
raw: qcow2: vhd:
In xend and old versions of libxl it was necessary to specify the format with a prefix. For
compatibility, these three prefixes are recognised as specifying the corresponding format. They are
equivalent to "format=FORMAT" or the specification of format (without a colon) as a positional
parameter.
script
Description
Specifies the script (deprecated)
Supported values
iscsi: nbd: enbd: drbd:
In xend and old versions of libxl it was necessary to specify the "script" (see above) with a prefix.
For compatibility, these four prefixes are recognised as specifying the corresponding script. They
are equivalent to "script=block-SCRIPT".
deprecated-prefix
Description
Deprecated prefix, ignored
Supported values
tapdisk: tap2: aio: ioemu: file: phy:
Various prefixes were required by xend and older versions of libxl to make the block devices work.
In some cases these options would override the backend type, but in other cases they would be ignored
in favour of "making it work"; in yet other cases it would be necessary to specify several of these,
for example:
tap:aio:/some/path...
All of these prefixes are now stripped and ignored.
Missing format and empty target
The following syntax is also supported:
,<vdev>:<devtype>,<access> (deprecated)
This is solely for compatibility with xend's syntax for empty cdroms, which is (for example)
",hdc:cdrom,r".
4.17.4-pre 2024-04-01 xl-disk-configuration(5)