QEMU: Difference between revisions

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-A generic and open source machine emulator and virtualizer
+[https://www.qemu.org/ QEMU] is a generic and open source machine emulator and virtualizer.
-== Install ==
+== Setup ==
+To install the main QEMU program system-wide, add the following to your <code>configuration.nix</code>:<syntaxhighlight lang=nix>
-<syntaxhighlight lang=nix>
    environment = {
      systemPackages = [ pkgs.qemu ];
    };
 </syntaxhighlight>
+{{Evaluate}}
 === Quick EMU ===
@@ Line 15: / Line 16: @@
 https://github.com/quickemu-project/quickemu
-```
+<syntaxhighlight lang=bash>
 quickget windows 11
 quickemu --vm windows-11.conf
-```
+</syntaxhighlight>
-== Booting UEFI ==
+== Configuration ==
-To boot UEFI systems using QEMU, the UEFI firmware replacing the BIOS implementation needs to be provided while starting QEMU.
-The following installs a script, that always starts QEMU with OVMF firmware implementing UEFI support.
+=== UEFI firmware support ===
+To enable UEFI firmware support in Virt-Manager, Libvirt, Gnome-Boxes etc. add following snippet to your system configuration and apply it<syntaxhighlight lang="nix">
+systemd.tmpfiles.rules = [ "L+ /var/lib/qemu/firmware - - - - ${pkgs.qemu}/share/qemu/firmware" ];
+</syntaxhighlight>
-<syntaxhighlight lang=nix>
+=== Run binaries of different architecture ===
- environment = {
+Following configuration will enable the emulation of different architectures. For example to run aarch64 and riscv64 binaries on an native x86_64 host, add following part to your system configuration, apply it and reboot your system.<syntaxhighlight lang="nix">
-   (pkgs.writeShellScriptBin "qemu-system-x86_64-uefi" ''
+boot.binfmt.emulatedSystems = [
-     qemu-system-x86_64 \
+  "aarch64-linux"
-       -bios ${pkgs.OVMF.fd}/FV/OVMF.fd \
+  "riscv64-linux"
-       "$@"
+];
-   '')
- };
 </syntaxhighlight>
+== Tips and tricks ==
+=== Emulate different architecture ===
+The following [[Flake]] file constructs and executes a NixOS virtual machine with an architecture distinct from that of the host system; in this example, it utilizes aarch64.
+Save the snippet as <code>flake.nix</code> and run <code>nix run</code> in the same directory to bootup the VM.<syntaxhighlight lang="nix">
+{
+  description = "Nix flake to build and run a NixOS VM for aarch64";
+  inputs = {
+    nixpkgs.url = "nixpkgs/nixos-24.05";
+  };
+  outputs = { self, nixpkgs }:
+  let
+    pkgs = import nixpkgs { system = "x86_64-linux"; };
+    pkgsAarch64 = import nixpkgs { system = "aarch64-linux"; };
+    iso = (pkgsAarch64.nixos {
+      imports = [ "${nixpkgs}/nixos/modules/installer/cd-dvd/installation-cd-base.nix" ];
+    }).config.system.build.isoImage;
+    vmScript = pkgs.writeScriptBin "run-nixos-vm" ''
+      #!${pkgs.runtimeShell}
+      ${pkgs.qemu}/bin/qemu-system-aarch64 \
+        -machine virt,gic-version=max \
+        -cpu max \
+        -m 2G \
+        -smp 4 \
+        -drive file=$(echo ${iso}/iso/*.iso),format=raw,readonly=on \
+        -nographic \
+        -bios ${pkgsAarch64.OVMF.fd}/FV/QEMU_EFI.fd
+    '';
+  in {
+    defaultPackage.x86_64-linux = vmScript;
+  };
+}
+</syntaxhighlight>Alternatively a different iso file can be specified in the drive-parameter, for example for Ubuntu Server ARM64.
+[[Category:Virtualization]]