IBM z15 announced

Today, IBM announced the new IBM Z models:

• IBM z15: See the official announcement for EMEA here, and for the US here.
• LinuxONE III: See the official announcement here.

Furthermore, check the updated IBM Z tested platforms matrix here.
We will look at features in support of the new IBM Z model in a separate blog entry soon.

virt-manager 2.2 released

virt-manager v2.2 was released a while ago. One feature we contributed is the ability to choose a temporary boot device. Here is a quick write-up on how to use that feature.

virt-xml is a simple command line tool for editing domain definitions. It can be used interactively or for batch processing. Starting with virt-manager v2.2, virt-xml allows to boot a guest with a temporarily changed domain definition. This allows us to specify a boot configuration other than the guest's current domain definition. This is especially useful as the IBM Z architecture allows for only a single boot device, and therefore the boot order settings do not work the way they do on other platforms: If the first boot device fails to boot, there is no attempt made to boot from the next boot device. In addition, the architecture/BIOS has no support for interactively changing the boot device during the boot/IPL process.
Therefore, two new command line options were introduced:

• --no-define makes any changes to the domain definition transient (i.e. the guest's persistent domain XML will not be modified)
• --start allows the user to start the domain after the changes to the domain XML were applied

Here is a simple example illustrating the usage:

1. First, select the device which should be changed by a selector. In this example, the unique target name of the disk is used. See man virt-xml for a list of further possibilities.
2. Temporarily modify the boot order, assign the first slot to device vdc, and start the guest right away:
   
     $ virt-xml --edit target='vdc' --disk='boot_order=1' --start \
                --no-define sample_domain
   Note: If there was another device that already had boot_order=1, its boot order would be incremented.

As soon the guest is stopped, the changes will vanish.

Webinar: How to Virtualize with KVM in Live Demo, August 28

Abstract
We will explain basic KVM concepts, including CPU and memory virtualization, storage, network management, as well as a brief overview about commonalities and differences with other virtualization environments. Furthermore, a live demo will demonstrate how to use the KVM management tools to create and install Linux guests, how to operate and monitor.

Speaker
Christian Bornträger, Chief Product Owner Linux and KVM on IBM Z.

Registration
Register here. You can check the system requirements here.
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the webinar.

Replay & Archive
All sessions are recorded. For the archive as well as a replay and handout of this session and all previous webcasts see here.

QEMU v4.1 released

QEMU v4.1 is out. For highlights from a KVM on Z perspective see the Release Notes.
Note: The DASD IPL feature is still considered experimental.

New Documentation: Configuring Crypto Express Adapters for KVM Guests

See here for a new documentation release on how to configure Crypto Express adapters for KVM guests.

SLES 15 SP1 released

SLES 15 SP1 is out! See the announcement and their release notes with Z-specific changes.
It ships the following code level updates:

• QEMU v3.1 (GA: v2.11)
• libvirt v5.1 (GA: v4.0)

See previous blog entries on QEMU v2.12, v3.0 and v3.1 for details on new features that become available with the QEMU package update.
Furthermore, SLES 15 SP1 introduces the kvm_stat tool, which can be used for guest event analysis.

KVM at SHARE Pittsburgh 2019

Yes, we will be at SHARE in Pittsburgh this August!
See the following session in the Linux and VM/Virtualization track:

• KVM on IBM Z News (Session #25978): Latest news on our development work with the open source community