bcvk - bootc virtualization kit

This project helps launch ephemeral VMs from bootc containers, and also create disk images that can be imported into other virtualization frameworks.

Installation

For now git clone && cargo build --release.

Quick Start

Running a bootc container as ephemeral VM

This doesn't require any privileges, it's just a wrapper for podman. It does require a virt stack (qemu, virtiofsd) in the host environment.

bcvk ephemeral run -d --rm -K --name mytestvm quay.io/fedora/fedora-bootc:42
bcvk ephemeral ssh mytestvm

Or to fully streamline the above and have the VM automatically terminate when you exit the SSH client:

bcvk ephemeral run-ssh quay.io/fedora/fedora-bootc:42

Everything with bcvk ephemeral creates a podman container that reuses the host virtualization stack, and

Creating a persistent bootable disk image from a container image

# Install bootc image to disk
bcvk to-disk quay.io/centos-bootc/centos-bootc:stream10 /path/to/disk.img

Image management

There's a convenient helper function which filters by all container images with the containers.bootc=1 label: bcvk images list

libvirt integration

The libvirt commands provide comprehensive integration with libvirt infrastructure for managing bootc containers as persistent VMs.

Running a bootc container as a libvirt VM

# Basic libvirt VM creation with default settings (2GB RAM, 2 CPUs, 20GB disk)
bcvk libvirt run quay.io/fedora/fedora-bootc:42

# Custom VM with specific resources and name
bcvk libvirt run --name my-fedora-vm --memory 4096 --cpus 4 --disk-size 50G quay.io/fedora/fedora-bootc:42

# Run VM with port forwarding and volume mounts
bcvk libvirt run --name web-server --port 8080:80 --volume /host/data:/mnt/data quay.io/centos-bootc/centos-bootc:stream10

# Run VM in background and automatically SSH into it
bcvk libvirt run --detach --ssh --name test-vm quay.io/fedora/fedora-bootc:42

Managing libvirt VMs

# List all bootc-related libvirt domains
bcvk libvirt list

# SSH into a running VM
bcvk libvirt ssh my-fedora-vm

# Stop a running VM
bcvk libvirt stop my-fedora-vm

# Start a stopped VM
bcvk libvirt start my-fedora-vm

# Get detailed information about a VM
bcvk libvirt inspect my-fedora-vm

# Remove a VM and its resources
bcvk libvirt rm my-fedora-vm

Advanced libvirt workflows

# Upload a pre-built disk image to libvirt storage
bcvk to-disk quay.io/fedora/fedora-bootc:42 /tmp/fedora.img
bcvk libvirt upload /tmp/fedora.img --name fedora-base

# Create a domain from uploaded image
bcvk libvirt create fedora-base --name my-vm --memory 8192

# Run with custom filesystem and network settings
bcvk libvirt run --filesystem xfs --network bridge quay.io/centos-bootc/centos-bootc:stream10

Goals

This project aims to implement part of https://gitlab.com/fedora/bootc/tracker/-/issues/2.

Basically it will be "bootc virtualization kit", and help users run bootable containers as virtual machines.

Related projects and content:

• https://github.com/coreos/coreos-assembler/
• https://github.com/ublue-os/bluefin-lts/blob/main/Justfile

Development

See docs/HACKING.md.