Re: [PATCH v6 5/7] vm-img: set vmware machine type to 64bit in our template

[Henning Schild <henning.schild@siemens.com>]

Am Tue, 24 May 2022 21:05:31 +0200
schrieb Jan Kiszka <jan.kiszka@siemens.com>:

> On 19.05.22 23:20, Henning Schild wrote:
> > Am Fri, 17 Dec 2021 17:48:33 +0300
> > schrieb Anton Mikanovich <amikan@ilbers.de>:
> >   
> >> From: Henning Schild <henning.schild@siemens.com>
> >>
> >> Tell vmware that it is dealing with a 64bit guest. Before that
> >> change an efi image could not be booted because the 32bit uefi
> >> firmware would not like a 64bit bootloader.  
> > 
> > In fact the machine config has DISTRO_ARCH ?= so people could
> > potentially go 32 bit after all.
> >   
> >> Signed-off-by: Henning Schild <henning.schild@siemens.com>
> >> ---
> >>  meta/classes/vm-img/vm-img-vmware.ovf.tmpl | 2 +-
> >>  1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)
> >>
> >> diff --git a/meta/classes/vm-img/vm-img-vmware.ovf.tmpl
> >> b/meta/classes/vm-img/vm-img-vmware.ovf.tmpl index 5280f33..2883ce0
> >> 100644 --- a/meta/classes/vm-img/vm-img-vmware.ovf.tmpl
> >> +++ b/meta/classes/vm-img/vm-img-vmware.ovf.tmpl
> >> @@ -16,7 +16,7 @@
> >>    <VirtualSystem ovf:id="vm">
> >>      <Info>A virtual machine</Info>
> >>      <Name>${OVA_NAME}</Name>
> >> -    <OperatingSystemSection ovf:id="1" vmw:osType="otherGuest">
> >> +    <OperatingSystemSection ovf:id="102"
> >> vmw:osType="otherGuest64">  
> > 
> > We could try and derive the value from DISTRO_ARCH.
> > 
> > But on the other hand we allow people to provide their own template
> > in case the default does not match.
> > 
> > This is a pitfall but not a big deal, just hoping that not too many
> > people end up building 32bit vmware images.
> > 
> > Not sure i will send a patch, probably not ... just saying for now.
> >   
> 
> We should ship the better default, and that is clearly 64-bit today.

The default is 64 and the templates can now be overridden in layers. So
let us just not do anything and get back here in case anyone brings a
real case that Isar might want to cater for with the templates in place.

Testing those images in CI is anyhow hard and not covered to a
boot-test. So isar catering for 32bit really sounds like a waste of
effort.

In fact i just posted all that to ask for an opinion and document
things for people reading the list or its archives.

Henning

> Jan
>