guestfs-release-notes-1.18(1)

NAME
guestfs-release-notes - libguestfs Release Notes

RELEASE NOTES FOR LIBGUESTFS 1.18
These release notes only cover the differences from the previous stable/dev branch split (1.16.0). For detailed changelogs, please see the git repository, or the ChangeLog file distributed in the tarball.

  New features
virt tools

   - virt-sysprep has been rewritten and expanded (thanks Wanlong Gao)
     http://libguestfs.org/virt-sysprep.1.html

   - virt-sparsify --zero is a new option that zeroes the named
     partition or filesystem

   - virt-sparsify can now safely sparsify Linux swap partitions

   - virt-sparsify fixed so it cleans up after ^C
     http://libguestfs.org/virt-sparsify.1.html

   - a new tool 'libguestfs-make-fixed-appliance' is provided to build
     fixed appliances that can be copied to other machines that don't
     have febootstrap support
     http://libguestfs.org/libguestfs-make-fixed-appliance.1.html

   - virt-filesystems now displays the parents (containers) of MD
     devices and volume groups

   - virt-alignment-scan, run with no args, displays alignment information
     for all libvirt domains

   - virt-df and virt-alignment-scan will display information from all
     guests even when a disk is inaccessible

   - virt-rescue new --scratch option to make scratch disks
     https://rwmj.wordpress.com/2012/04/26/virt-rescue-scratch/#content

   - virt-make-fs can now be used to create btrfs

   - virt-edit preserves permissions, UID, GID and SELinux context
     when editing files

   - guestfish passes the close event over stdout and remote correctly

   - guestfish new '--pipe-error' option lets you detect errors in pipe
     commands

   - guestfish globs now expand device names

   - comma and colon characters in filenames now handled correctly by
     all virt tools

inspection

   - added support for Fedora 17+

   - added support for FreeDOS

   - added support for Buildroot and Cirros

   - inspection is now compatible with Windows guests that have been
     sysprepped (thanks Grant Williamson).

API

   - broad support for btrfs added, including adding multiple devices,
     fsck, snapshots (thanks Wanlong Gao)

   - the new 'mount-local' API brings FUSE support directly into the
     core libguestfs API
     https://rwmj.wordpress.com/2012/05/14/tip-using-mount-local-api-from-c/#content

   - new man page: guestfs-performance(1), which contains performance
     tuning tips
     http://libguestfs.org/guestfs-performance.1.html

   - new man page: guestfs-faq(1), Frequently Asked Questions
     http://libguestfs.org/guestfs-faq.1.html

   - ENOTSUP (from guestfs_last_errno) is now returned for APIs that
     are not supported

examples

   - 'copy_over' example showing how to copy between two handles

   - 'display_icon' program displays the icon associated with a guest

   - 'mount_local.c' example shows how to use the mount-local API

  Security
  (no security problems were found or fixed in this release)

  New APIs
  btrfs-device-add: Add devices to a btrfs filesystem.
  btrfs-device-delete: Remove devices from a btrfs filesystem.
  btrfs-filesystem-sync: Sync a btrfs filesystem.
  btrfs-filesystem-balance: Balance a btrfs filesystem.
  btrfs-fsck: Check btrfs filesystem.
  btrfs-set-seeding: Enable or disable seeding.
  btrfs-subvolume-create: Create a btrfs snapshot.
  btrfs-subvolume-delete: Delete a btrfs snapshot.
  btrfs-subvolume-list: List btrfs snapshots and subvolumes.
  btrfs-subvolume-set-default: Set default btrfs subvolume.
  btrfs-subvolume-snapshot: Create a writable btrfs snapshot.
  get-e2attrs: List ext2 file attributes of a file.
  get-e2generation: Get ext2 file generation of a file.
  isoinfo, isoinfo-device: Get information from the header of ISO files.
  llz: List files with SELinux information.
  lvcreate-free: Create an LVM logical volume in % remaining free space.
  md-stat: Return underlying devices from an MD device.
  mkfs-brtfs: Make btrfs filesystem, with all tunables.
  mount-local, mount-local-run, umount-local: FUSE support in the API.
  ntfsclone-in, ntfsclone-out: Save, restore NTFS from backup.
  ntfsfix: Fix common errors and force Windows to check NTFS.
  set-e2attrs: Set or clear ext2 file attributes of a file.
  set-e2generation: Set ext2 file generation of a file.
  set-label: Unified interface for setting filesystem label.
  vgmeta: Get volume group metadata.
  wipefs: Wipe filesystem signatures from a device.
  zero-free-space: Zero free space in a filesystem.

  Internals
 - The debian/ subdirectory has been removed.  We recommend you use
   the official Debian packages made by Hilko Bengen.
   http://people.debian.org/~bengen/libguestfs/
   http://packages.debian.org/search?keywords=libguestfs

 - O_CLOEXEC / SOCK_CLOEXEC is now used for almost all file
   descriptors that the library opens.

 - posix_fadvise is called when sequentially reading or writing large
   files.

 - close all file descriptors and remove all signal handlers in the
   recovery process

 - multiple gcc warnings and Coverity bugs have been fixed;  many
   strict-overflow bugs have also been fixed

 - use ./configure --enable-valgrind-daemon to use valgrind on the
   daemon;  many errors have been fixed

 - use ./configure --with-qemu-options to pass extra options to qemu

 - the daemon now has a growable strings buffer type (DECLARE_STRINGSBUF)

 - the <guestfs.h> header file works with C++ and we have a regression
   test for this

 - multiple APIs which should only be called in the CONFIG state now
   give an error if they are not

 - .gitignore fixed to use absolute paths

 - gobject bindings have been expanded, including mapping libguestfs
   events to gobject signals (thanks Matt Booth)

 - gobject documentation is generated properly (thanks Matt Booth)

 - gobject header files now live in a subdirectory

 - CompareWithString test in the generator now works

 - FUInt32, FUInt64 struct field types now use the correct XDR type

 - OCaml tests are now run on bytecode and native code.

 - java -Xlint:all is used, and all warnings have been fixed

 - bmptopng, wrestool (etc) missing or failure no longer prints
   warning messages

 - ruby: Use RbConfig instead of Config.

 - PYTHONPATH is set by the ./run script.

 - appliance building is now thread-safe.

 - appliance now uses 'ip' instead of 'ifconfig' and 'netstat'
   commands

 - several fixes to make parallel builds work properly

 - guestfish --listen now cleans up properly

 - the BUSY state has been removed

 - gettextize has been removed, replaced by a simple Makefile.am

 - gettext support now covers virt-resize, virt-sparsify and virt-sysprep

 - better support for the arm architecture

  Bugs fixed
 - 822490 virt-ls error: "libguestfs: error: checksum: path: parameter cannot be NULL"
 - 816839 data overflow error when debug progress -1
 - 816098 virt-make-fs fails to make a btrfs filesystem because it doesn't allocate enough space
 - 811872 inspection fails on ubuntu 10.04 guest with encrypted swap
 - 811650 guestfs_last_error not set when qemu fails early during launch
 - 811649 libguestfs cannot open disk images which are symlinks to files that contain ':' (colon) character
 - 811117 [RFE][virt-sysprep] net-hwaddr not removed from "ifcfg-*" files on rhel
 - 811112 [RFE][virt-sysprep] hostname can not be changed on rhel system
 - 809361 inspection doesn't recognize Fedora 18 (grub2 + GPT)
 - 807905 mkfs blocksize option breaks when creating btrfs
 - 805070 virt-filesystems should show 'parents' of LV and RAID devices
 - 804464 libguestfs cannot be built when LINGUAS is different then ja or uk
 - 803664 libguestfs inspection fails on Windows XP: libguestfs: error: hivex: could not locate HKLM\SYSTEM\MountedDevices
 - 803533 guestfish: write error
 - 802389 event handlers for 'close' event doesn't work in remote mode
 - 802109 libguestfs uses putc on stderr, results in many individual 1 byte writes of debug messages
 - 801640 [RFE] the error reported by resize2fs-M need to be more clear
 - 801298 Possible null dereference and resource leaks
 - 801273 Document for set-pgroup need to be updated
 - 798196 virt-resize confuses format and output_format variables; using --output-format sets the input format
 - 797986 virt-resize on Windows XP in sysprep state causes "UNMOUNTABLE_BOOT_VOLUME" BSOD
 - 796520 [RFE] Prevent user from running some appliance configure commands after appliance boot up
 - 790721 multiprovider build error: RuntimeError: link: /tmp/.guestfs-0/kernel /tmp/.guestfs-0/kernel.10139: File exists
 - 789960 guestfsd crash when try to mount non-exist disk
 - 789504 virt-df (other tools?) should not give up if a guest disk is missing
 - 788641 virt-edit doesn't preserve file permissions
 - 786215 libguestfs inspection does not recognize FreeDOS operating system
 - 786188 libguestfs inspection does not recognize FreeDOS install CD
 - 785668 aug-defnode: daemon crash
 - 784647 Libguestfs uses deprecated net-tools
 - 769304 virt-resize on RHEL 6 kernel fails to re-read the partition table
 - 755729 Error message for resize2fs-M needs tweaking
 - 701814 virt-win-reg fails on a libvirt guest that has no defined disk format: "format parameter is empty or contains disallowed characters"
 - 679737 libguestfs: improve error message when zerofree is not available in the appliance
 - 635971 glob mkfs ext2 /dev/vd[b-t]1 does not expand

SEE ALSO
guestfs-examples(1), guestfs-faq(1), guestfs-performance(1), guestfs-recipes(1), guestfs-testing(1), guestfs(3), guestfish(1), http://libguestfs.org/

AUTHOR
Richard W.M. Jones

COPYRIGHT
Copyright (C) 2009-2025 Red Hat Inc.

LICENSE
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301 USA.

BUGS
To get a list of bugs against libguestfs, use this link: https://bugzilla.redhat.com/buglist.cgi?component=libguestfs&product=Virtualization+Tools

To report a new bug against libguestfs, use this link: https://bugzilla.redhat.com/enter_bug.cgi?component=libguestfs&product=Virtualization+Tools

When reporting a bug, please supply:

•   The version of libguestfs.

•   Where you got libguestfs (eg. which Linux distro, compiled from source, etc)

•   Describe the bug accurately and give a way to reproduce it.

•   Run libguestfs-test-tool(1) and paste the complete, unedited output into the bug report.