Re: [Qemu-devel] Looking for an easy way to exchange data bidirectional between host and guest (including some suggestion)

[Henrik Nordstrom]

On Mon, 6 Jun 2005, Jim C. Brown wrote:

> Hmm...what if you don't have root/administrator access? It could still work if
> you are determined enough, but thats not the sort of thing you want to force
> onto a beginner.

Then write a suitable wrapper install package around a suitable small FTP 
daemon allowing beinners to set it up on a non-root port using user-net 
port redirection options to hide this for the guest.

Or spend some time on the generalised user-net pipe support mentioned 
earlier allowing the SMB suppor to be more easily configured/tailored.

FTP unfortunately doesn't fit in the user-net pipe framework due to it's 
(ftp) broken design (data channel mess).

HTTP could fit quite nicely in the pipe framework, but is't terribly 
useful as a general bi-directional exchange method due to client 
requirements..

SSH in theory could fit into the pipe framework, but lack of a suitable 
server-side which can run as non-root is somewhat hindering.

rlogin/rcp/rsh fits quite nicely in the pipe framework, with some small 
modifications on the server-side to allow them to run as non-root.

Thinking of it tftp should also fit very nicely in the user-net pipe 
framework, given a suitably relaxed tftp server..

> Of course, that doesn't apply if you cant use SMB, as was this person's case.
> (Does the SMB support in qemu even work on Windows hosts?)

The SMB glue is for all hosts except Windows. On Windows you have to use 
the native SMB filesharing.

In theory it may be possible to enable the SMB glue on Windows as well, 
but this requires a working Samba on Windows..

> Giving the TFTP write access is probably the way to go (iirc this person would
> have used TFTP in lieu of FTP, except that write access was required which made
> TFTP a non-option).

Extending the existing TFTP code to also provide write access is higly 
preferable to adding a user-net FTP emulation in my eyes. Shouldn't be 
more than one or at most two screens of code.

Regards
Henrik