How to get a CLI for a virtual machine on XenServer?

Question

I created a Debian Lenny virtual machine as described on the manual. How to control it?

It has no IP since my LAN has DHCP disabled. If it only had a static IP and SSHD enabled I could just PuTTY it.

Answer 1

With Citrix XenServer, you have the control interface called XenCenter with which you can connect to your hypervisor and do such things.

With OSS Xen, you can use the xm console command.

Answer 2

Besides the gui/vnc consoles you can still use the equivlent of xm console

On the host console: xe vm-list to get the list of domins running (just note the uuid of the domain you want). list_domains will list the domain name and the uuid of the domains. Match up your uuid so you get the proper dom_id

then

xm console equivlent is /usr/lib/xen/bin/xenconsole dom_id

Its not in the root users $PATH though I think it ought to be. Of course you can symlink it or alter your path yourself but it would be a sensible default.

Example:

Say I want to connect to knox (a linux domU)

[root@xen01 ~]# xe vm-list

uuid ( RO)           : 8258a6d4-23f6-003d-30d7-65bd13086863
     name-label ( RW): knox
    power-state ( RO): running


uuid ( RO)           : 1a191475-a99d-7a77-6550-b30a0038fd92
     name-label ( RW): Windows Server 2008 SP2 x86
    power-state ( RO): halted


uuid ( RO)           : ffd95724-d818-4f15-b4b4-159b7ff41df4
     name-label ( RW): Control domain on host: xen01
    power-state ( RO): running

Now get domain ids

[root@xen01 ~]# list_domains
 id |                                 uuid |  state
  0 | ffd95724-d818-4f15-b4b4-159b7ff41df4 |     R 
  1 | bc150966-8c21-7ad9-c329-839d5823041d |    B H
  7 | baa3699b-95dd-eea0-ccc4-51e8972857f5 |    B  
 11 | 8258a6d4-23f6-003d-30d7-65bd13086863 |    B  

You can see the domain ID that matches the UUID of knox is 11. So we use xenconsole

[root@xen01 ~]# /usr/lib/xen/bin/xenconsole 11
(press enter)
You have new mail in /var/spool/mail/root
[root@knox ~]#