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Oracle® VM Server User's Guide Release 2.1 Part Number E10898-04 |
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# 5 Domain Monitoring and Administration

This Chapter contains information on the Oracle VM Server domain lifecycle, monitoring and administration. It contains:

- Domain Lifecycle

- Using the xm Command-Line Interface

You can use Oracle VM Manager to monitor domains running on Oracle VM Server, or you can use the xm command. Using Oracle VM Manager is the recommended method of managing domains. See the Oracle VM Manager User's Guide for information on using Oracle VM Manager to manage domains (virtual machines).

## 5.1 Domain Lifecycle

There are a number of states in which a domain may exist. They are:

- Starting (initializing)

- Running

- Paused

- Suspended

- Stopping (shutting down)

- Powered off (stopped)

A start operation can take the domain from the stopped (powered down) state to the paused state, or the running state. From the running state, a suspend action takes the domain to the suspended state, and a resume operation takes it back to the running state. The transition to and from the suspended state could also happen from the paused state.

A domain in the running state could go to the paused state through the pause command, and return to the running state by the resume command. A domain in the running state could transition into the stopped state through a clean, or hard shut down.

## 5.2 Using the xm Command-Line Interface

You can create, destroy, manage and migrate domains using the xm command-line interface. You can enter parameters to the xm command-line tool in the format:

xm [option] [argument]

For example, to pause a domain called mydomain, enter

    # xm pause mydomain

See "xm" in Appendix A, "Command-Line Tools" for detailed information on the xm command-line interface.

### 5.2.1 Monitoring Domains

The `xm top` command performs real time monitoring of domain loads on a host. The `xm top` command displays the following information:

- The state of each domain.

- The number of domains on the host.

- Memory statistics of the host, such as the total available memory, the memory in use, and free memory.

- The CPU statistics of the host, such as the number of CPUs and CPU speed.

- Information on each domain, such as domain name, domain state, CPU usage in seconds, percentage of CPU, memory in Kilobytes, and so on.

For example, an `xm top` command displays output similar to:

Figure 5-1 Example xm top Command Output

Description of "Figure 5-1 Example xm top Command Output"

Note that the format of each line of output wraps over two lines.

### 5.2.2 Viewing Host Information

Use the `xm info`, `xm log`, and `xm dmesg` commands to display information about the host computer. For example, the `xm info` command displays output similar to the following:

Figure 5-2 Example xm info Command Output

Description of "Figure 5-2 Example xm info Command Output"