Are VMs with file-based disk images supported as well?

[Pickwick]

Hi everyone,

I’m considering building my own home server based on TrueNAS and would like to have support for VMs and containers. I’ve used Proxmox with ZFS at my work in the past and by default, Proxmox created ZVOLs for VM images as well. Though, it was easy to change that by adding ZFS datasets as directory based storage and get file based VM-images instead. I prefer files instead of ZVOLs for easier handling like copying things around, zipping, using RSYNC etc. Files make everything easier in my opinion. My home server doesn’t need bleeding edge I/O performance as well, it’s mainly used for backups over WLAN or even only remotely with uploads of ~20 MBit.

Looking at the docs about how to create a VM with TrueNAS, the screenshot mentions ZVOLs only:

Adding and Managing VMs

Can that be changed to a plain file wherever I like instead? Might the input just be badly described and it expects whatever path to whatever file/ZVOL I provide anyway already?

Thanks!

[dan]

@Pickwick

Can that be changed to a plain file wherever I like instead?

No, your understanding of the docs is correct.

[Krisbee]

@Pickwick

I prefer files instead of ZVOLs for easier handling like copying things around, zipping, using RSYNC etc. Files make everything easier in my opinion.
Thanks!

The only possible way to do this is to run a separate instance of ibvirtd in a systemd-nspawn container using jailmaker. Then your vms can use qcow2 or raw files. You would potentially be able to manage such vms remotely via virt-manager, for example.

[Stux]

There is an option to use raw file devices… never tried it. Not sure if it works. Etc.