Issued:
2011-12-06
Updated:
2011-12-06

RHBA-2011:1643 - python-virtinst bug fix and enhancement update

Synopsis

python-virtinst bug fix and enhancement update

Type/Severity

Bug Fix Advisory (none)

Topic

An updated python-virtinst package that fixes several bugs and adds various enhancements is now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.

Description

The python-virtinst package provides a Python module that helps build and install libvirt-based virtual machines.

The python-virtinst package has been upgraded to upstream version 0.600.0, which provides a number of bug fixes and enhancements over the previous version. In particular, this update fixes the following bugs:

  • Prior to this update, optimal cache and asynchronous I/O defaults were applied when a virtual machine was created, but not when a new device was added to an existing guest. This negatively affected the performance of such devices. With this update, the underlying source code has been corrected to apply the optimized defaults to new disks for existing guests as well. (BZ#684786)

  • The virtinst module for Python often called the ifconfig program unnecessarily when parsing a domain XML file. Consequent to this, if a domain contained many "direct" network interfaces, the virt-manager application responded so slowly that it could not be used properly. This update removes the redundant ifconfig calls from the code, and virt-manager now works well even with a large number of "direct" network interfaces. (BZ#696969)

  • When using the virt-install utility, an attempt to use the "--location" (or "-l") command line option to specify an ISO image file rendered the guest unable to find this image during installation. This update corrects the underlying source code to make sure such guests can now find the ISO image as expected. (BZ#697798)

  • When the user attempted to use the virt-install utility to specify a static SELinux label, the utility failed to create correct guest configuration and the static SELinux label did not take effect for this guest. This update ensures that virt-install now generates correct configuration so that the static labels can be set as expected. (BZ#698085)

  • When the user attempted to run the virt-install command with a mixed-case value of the "--cpu" option, the previous version of the virt-install utility failed with an error, because it automatically converted values passed on the command line to lower case. This update corrects the utility to preserve the case of command line arguments, and the "virt-install --cpu" command can now be run with a mixed-case value as expected. (BZ#727986)

  • Due to the virt-install utility not specifying any clock policy for Windows guests, the time on the guest could skew from the time on the host. To prevent this, this update adapts the virt-install utility to specify the tickpolicy "catchup". (BZ#742736)

As well, this update adds the following enhancements:

  • A new "--disk device=cdrom" command line option is now supported by the virt-install utility. This option allows the user to specify a CD-ROM or diskette drive without inserted media. (BZ#691304)

  • A new "--numatune" command line option is now supported by the virt-install utility. This option allows the user to specify the Non-Uniform Memory Access (NUMA) nodes for memory pinning. (BZ#691331)

  • The virt-install utility can now be used to create Linux container guests. This includes application containers and full OS containers. Note that no tool is provided for creating an OS directory tree and users must build this tree manually. (BZ#693876)

All users of python-virtinst are advised to upgrade to this updated package, which fixes these bugs and adds these enhancements.

Solution

Before applying this update, make sure all previously-released errata relevant to your system have been applied.

This update is available via the Red Hat Network. Details on how to use the Red Hat Network to apply this update are available at This content is not included.https://access.redhat.com/kb/docs/DOC-11259

Affected Products

ProductVersionArch
Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Scientific Computing6x86_64
Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, big endian6ppc64
Red Hat Enterprise Linux for IBM z Systems6s390x
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation6x86_64
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation6i386
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server6x86_64
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server6i386
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server from RHUI6x86_64
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server from RHUI6i386
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support6x86_64
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support6i386
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support Extension6x86_64
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support Extension6i386
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support Extension (for IBM z Systems)6s390x
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support (for IBM z Systems)6s390x
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop6x86_64
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop6i386

Updated Packages

  • python-virtinst-0.600.0-5.el6.noarch.rpm
  • python-virtinst-0.600.0-5.el6.src.rpm

Fixes

CVEs

(none)

References

(none)

Additional information