Host File System for virtual machine

SUSE Product Topics SLES Virtualization
1

Good day:
I have a new server for a small business. I have 4 TB of space available for virtual machines. Btrfs is the default file system. I would like to create a partition just for images. I was thinking of creating a 2.5 TB partition using ext3. I have the following two questions.
1.) Should I just leave the filesystem type on BtrFS, or does ext3 make sense for virtual machine images? (guest OS will be OES 2015 (Sles 11 SP4 base).
2.) when trying to create a partition of 2.5 TB of ext3 on /var/lib/libvirt/images, I get a warning of "Some subvolumes of the root filesystem are shadowed by mount points of other filesystems. This could lead to problems. @/var/li/libvirt/images. Really use this setup?

Looking for advice as to the best way to proceed.

Please advise at your earliest convenience.
Regards,
Paul

2

Hi and welcome to the Forum :slight_smile:
I would look at using xfs rather than ext3 for /var/lib/libvirt/images
1.) I would leave it as the guest defaults…
2.) You need to exclude/delete the subvolume via the expert partitioner, so it’ not a subvol=@/… in /etc/fstab.

UUID=... /var/lib/libvirt/images xfs defaults 1 2
instead of;
UUID=... /var/lib/libvirt/images btrfs subvol=@/var/lib/libvirt/images 0 0

PS you might want to update to a supported release, eg SLES 12 SP3 for the host system?

3

[QUOTE=malcolmlewis;50891]Hi and welcome to the Forum :slight_smile:
I would look at using xfs rather than ext3 for /var/lib/libvirt/images
1.) I would leave it as the guest defaults…
2.) You need to exclude/delete the subvolume via the expert partitioner, so it’ not a subvol=@/… in /etc/fstab.

UUID=... /var/lib/libvirt/images xfs defaults 1 2
instead of;
UUID=... /var/lib/libvirt/images btrfs subvol=@/var/lib/libvirt/images 0 0

PS you might want to update to a supported release, eg SLES 12 SP3 for the host system?[/QUOTE]

Thanks for the feedback.
I checked and indeed installed Sles 12 SP3.
I do not see the subvolumes listed in Expert Partitioner. Is there a way to remove the one entry so it is no longer a subvolume? I had not considered XFS as i was not aware of the file system properties. I will give it a try.

Thank you in advance.
Regards,
Paul

4

[QUOTE=apmcomp;50892]Thanks for the feedback.
I checked and indeed installed Sles 12 SP3.
I do not see the subvolumes listed in Expert Partitioner. Is there a way to remove the one entry so it is no longer a subvolume? I had not considered XFS as i was not aware of the file system properties. I will give it a try.

Thank you in advance.
Regards,
Paul[/QUOTE]
Hi
Yes, if you select the partition that has / on it and edit, there is a button for subvolume handling, select this and in the list highlight the volume and select remove. Then go back and create your partition for /var/lib/libvirt/images.

PS, fixed the thread prefix as well :wink: