macOS x86_64 emulation and vz virtualization

[miquecg]

Hi,

I have a running colima instance on macOS 13.4 ARM host, configured with x86_64 cpu, vz virtualization, rosetta enabled and virtiofs. It's running fine but I'm wondering if this setup is even possible.

Reported status matches what is configured in the YAML file but I suspect it's actually running on qemu. I've noticed that in some debug messages when booting instance up. How can I double check this?

Thanks!

[sebastianrothe]

Why do you think that this is not possible?

VZ is the virt framework from Apple.
Rosetta is the emulation framework for x86 from Apple.

My guess is, that your cpuType is ignored, because you use vz. cpuType is only possible with qemu.

You can double-check with ActivityManager. You will either see a process qemu or VirtualMachineService and Kind Apple.

[miquecg]

As I was suspecting, qemu is actually running hence my assumption that this setup is not yet possible with macOS Virtualization Framework or some setting I'm using is not compatible.

My guess is, that your cpuType is ignored, because you use vz. cpuType is only possible with qemu.

Sorry, I meant architecture is x86_64. cpuType setting is set to host as per defaults.

[sebastianrothe]

Is there a reason you have to use x86_64? You should go native and the use the emulation framework rosetta same like Apple does.

[miquecg]

Not really that I know of yet. It was partly because a misunderstanding of how emulation is achieved. I didn't realize setting arch to x86_64 would force to use qemu emulation instead of Rosetta, which I guess is a better option on macOS given it works (I've seen reports from people with problems related to Rosetta emulation). Gonna give a try anyway.

Thanks.

[buncis]

I think --arch x86_64 forcing colima to use qemu instead vz, and therefore it can't use rosetta

[pPanda-beta]

But any code which is taking such crucial decision should show warnings.
For me same happened, silently it started qemu.

I checked by

ps aux  |  grep qemu

# Output: /opt/homebrew/bin/qemu-system-x86_64 ... -name lima-colima -pidfile /Users/****/.colima/_lima/colima/qemu.pid ...