Correct way to protect `guix system vm` invocations from garbage collection?

Correct way to protect `guix system vm` invocations from garbage collection?

[Ben Weinstein-Raun]

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Hello!


I'm working on setting up permanent virtual machines to run as services.
In order for this to work, I think I need to be sure that the various
inputs to the vm runner script are kept alive. This includes the kernel,
the initrd, and the qemu binary.


What's the easiest way to permanently mark an arbitrary store file (in
this case, the `...-run-vm.sh` script) as "alive"? e.g. is there a way
to add it to my user's profile, or some other gc-root? Or add it to a
new profile altogether?

Thanks!


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Re: Correct way to protect `guix system vm` invocations from garbage collection?

[Julien Lepiller]

Hi Ben,

If by "as a service", you mean started by the Shepherd, you should be good: the vm path will become alive as it's part of the system.

Another solution would be to make it a gc root, which you can do by symlinking it in /var/guix/gc-roots

Le 6 janvier 2024 00:31:05 GMT+01:00, Ben Weinstein-Raun <root@benwr.net> a écrit :
>Hello!
>
>
>I'm working on setting up permanent virtual machines to run as services.
>In order for this to work, I think I need to be sure that the various
>inputs to the vm runner script are kept alive. This includes the kernel,
>the initrd, and the qemu binary.
>
>
>What's the easiest way to permanently mark an arbitrary store file (in
>this case, the `...-run-vm.sh` script) as "alive"? e.g. is there a way
>to add it to my user's profile, or some other gc-root? Or add it to a
>new profile altogether?
>
>Thanks!
>

Re: Correct way to protect `guix system vm` invocations from garbage collection?

[Ben Weinstein-Raun]

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On 01/06/24 02:33, Julien Lepiller wrote:

> If by "as a service", you mean started by the Shepherd, you should be good: the vm path will become alive as it's part of the system.

Ah, that makes sense! I assume this is only true if it's properly in a
profile (either guix home profile or the system profile) as opposed to
being added as a user-level shepherd service not inside my home
directory. I was planning to do the latter, since I'm not sure how to
properly describe the vm in a manifest (though I imagine I could examine
the source code for `guix system vm` to find out).

> Another solution would be to make it a gc root, which you can do by symlinking it in /var/guix/gc-roots
Perfect, that seems to work great! Thanks a ton!

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