[Spice-devel] Status of 0.6 release

[Gerd Hoffmann]

   Hi,

> * Qemu integration
>
> We have a new qemu repository, based on the current upstream version,
> with clean patch-series using a new, nicer spice API. Patches have been
> posted upstream at least for the initial integration (no qxl device
> support yet though). There has been any feedback yet though, so its hard
> to judge the status here. Will it be possible to get this merged?

The qemu patches posted don't build due to the qxl parser work and the 
spice-protocol changes.  I don't expect the spice patches are being 
merged quickly for a number of reasons:

   (1) I'd like to have the qxl parser work finished first.  Having
       qxl and spice structs clearly separated makes it easier to
       maintain a really stable libspice-server interface for qxl/qemu.
   (2) I'll be two weeks away end July (summer vacation).
   (3) There is KVM forum early in August.

That means I'll be able to really push the merge end Aug / start Sep, 
before that I'm offline or busy with other stuff.  Also:

   (4) Anthony doesn't want squeeze spice into the 0.13 release and
       instead merge it early in the 0.14 devel cycle, so we have time
       to hash out any issues poping up.
   (5) There is a huge amount of unmerged qemu patches right now :-(
       Looks like Anthony hasn't much time to work on qemu right now.
       I wouldn't be surprised if the qemu 0.13 release gets delayed.

I have a bunch of qemu patches (also vgabios patches) which are needed 
for spice but which are also useful without spice.  Tried to push them. 
  Not very successful so far ...

> * PCI compatibility layer
>
> We've landed most of this, however there are still a few items left to
> do before we can remove all use of draw.h from the qxl users and make
> the spice types internal. Missing types are: SpiceCursorHeader,
> SpiceImageDescriptor, SpiceBitmap, SpiceQUICData, SpiceSurface. When
> these are done we also need to move the draw.h header from
> spice-protocol to spice/common and remove the packed attributes.

/me is working on this.

> There are also some other things we need to look at:
>
> * New agent implementation
>
> We have a new agent implementation using virtio rather than a custom
> protocol. I believe the new qemu repositiory has the qemu side code for
> this and i don't think the spice side needs any changes. Right?

Correct (vdi_port is in the new qemu repo too, but only temporary and 
not planned to be pushed upstream).

> * Live migration
>
> With the new qemu stuff we've lost live migration. This would be very
> good to get back. I don't know the status of this and what blocks it.
> Gerd, what is the status here?

savevm + loadvm + vm migration should work just fine.
spice client migration doesn't work.

> * Migration from 0.4 to 0.6
>
> This is not possible atm. Is it doable? Is it interesting? Opinions?

vdesktop -> qemu (as in upstream repos) isn't doable for multiple reasons.

cheers,
   Gerd