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authorPeter Maydell <peter.maydell@linaro.org>2020-11-12 14:40:40 +0000
committerPeter Maydell <peter.maydell@linaro.org>2020-11-23 11:10:04 +0000
commit773ee3f1ea50eb996cced930cc29b1b27bfbc6fa (patch)
tree2e5952023dd1b0ffdc4a1c4357beea9bd4a6ec15 /docs/tools
parent0daf34fd3a18aa2a43217c320e2a39d69e52d3f4 (diff)
docs: Split qemu-pr-helper documentation into tools manual
Split the documentation of the qemu-pr-helper binary into the tools manual, and give it a manpage like our other standalone executables. Signed-off-by: Peter Maydell <peter.maydell@linaro.org> Reviewed-by: Alex Bennée <alex.bennee@linaro.org>
Diffstat (limited to 'docs/tools')
-rw-r--r--docs/tools/conf.py2
-rw-r--r--docs/tools/index.rst1
-rw-r--r--docs/tools/qemu-pr-helper.rst90
3 files changed, 93 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/docs/tools/conf.py b/docs/tools/conf.py
index 9052d17d6d..4760d36ff2 100644
--- a/docs/tools/conf.py
+++ b/docs/tools/conf.py
@@ -22,6 +22,8 @@ man_pages = [
['Fabrice Bellard'], 1),
('qemu-nbd', 'qemu-nbd', u'QEMU Disk Network Block Device Server',
['Anthony Liguori <anthony@codemonkey.ws>'], 8),
+ ('qemu-pr-helper', 'qemu-pr-helper', 'QEMU persistent reservation helper',
+ [], 8),
('qemu-trace-stap', 'qemu-trace-stap', u'QEMU SystemTap trace tool',
[], 1),
('virtfs-proxy-helper', 'virtfs-proxy-helper',
diff --git a/docs/tools/index.rst b/docs/tools/index.rst
index 232ce9f3e4..b99f86c7c6 100644
--- a/docs/tools/index.rst
+++ b/docs/tools/index.rst
@@ -12,6 +12,7 @@ Contents:
qemu-img
qemu-nbd
+ qemu-pr-helper
qemu-trace-stap
virtfs-proxy-helper
virtiofsd
diff --git a/docs/tools/qemu-pr-helper.rst b/docs/tools/qemu-pr-helper.rst
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..ac036180ac
--- /dev/null
+++ b/docs/tools/qemu-pr-helper.rst
@@ -0,0 +1,90 @@
+QEMU persistent reservation helper
+==================================
+
+Synopsis
+--------
+
+**qemu-pr-helper** [*OPTION*]
+
+Description
+-----------
+
+Implements the persistent reservation helper for QEMU.
+
+SCSI persistent reservations allow restricting access to block devices
+to specific initiators in a shared storage setup. When implementing
+clustering of virtual machines, it is a common requirement for virtual
+machines to send persistent reservation SCSI commands. However,
+the operating system restricts sending these commands to unprivileged
+programs because incorrect usage can disrupt regular operation of the
+storage fabric. QEMU's SCSI passthrough devices ``scsi-block``
+and ``scsi-generic`` support passing guest persistent reservation
+requests to a privileged external helper program. :program:`qemu-pr-helper`
+is that external helper; it creates a socket which QEMU can
+connect to to communicate with it.
+
+If you want to run VMs in a setup like this, this helper should be
+started as a system service, and you should read the QEMU manual
+section on "persistent reservation managers" to find out how to
+configure QEMU to connect to the socket created by
+:program:`qemu-pr-helper`.
+
+After connecting to the socket, :program:`qemu-pr-helper` can
+optionally drop root privileges, except for those capabilities that
+are needed for its operation.
+
+:program:`qemu-pr-helper` can also use the systemd socket activation
+protocol. In this case, the systemd socket unit should specify a
+Unix stream socket, like this::
+
+ [Socket]
+ ListenStream=/var/run/qemu-pr-helper.sock
+
+Options
+-------
+
+.. program:: qemu-pr-helper
+
+.. option:: -d, --daemon
+
+ run in the background (and create a PID file)
+
+.. option:: -q, --quiet
+
+ decrease verbosity
+
+.. option:: -v, --verbose
+
+ increase verbosity
+
+.. option:: -f, --pidfile=PATH
+
+ PID file when running as a daemon. By default the PID file
+ is created in the system runtime state directory, for example
+ :file:`/var/run/qemu-pr-helper.pid`.
+
+.. option:: -k, --socket=PATH
+
+ path to the socket. By default the socket is created in
+ the system runtime state directory, for example
+ :file:`/var/run/qemu-pr-helper.sock`.
+
+.. option:: -T, --trace [[enable=]PATTERN][,events=FILE][,file=FILE]
+
+ .. include:: ../qemu-option-trace.rst.inc
+
+.. option:: -u, --user=USER
+
+ user to drop privileges to
+
+.. option:: -g, --group=GROUP
+
+ group to drop privileges to
+
+.. option:: -h, --help
+
+ Display a help message and exit.
+
+.. option:: -V, --version
+
+ Display version information and exit.