What is QEMU-GUI?

[JusGellin]

I see that at least one of the KL's has QEMU-GUI that can be selected (KLA-Manjaro).

What is this? Is it a manager for QEMU's and also just an emulator for different os structures?
Can it manage several live vms at the same time?

I'm just wondering how efficient it is compared with just using QEMU that accesses hardware needs directly and doesn't have to be emulated to work.

Thanks

[josejp2424]

The QEMU-GUI included in KLA-Manjaro is essentially a graphical front-end for managing QEMU, which is a powerful virtualization tool. This GUI makes it easier to run and manage virtual machines (VMs) by providing a user-friendly interface to configure and start VMs. You can select options like how much memory to allocate or how many CPU cores to use, without needing to run QEMU commands directly in the terminal.

The GUI allows you to emulate different OS structures and manage multiple live VMs simultaneously. While the GUI simplifies the process, QEMU still runs with direct hardware access when virtualization extensions (like KVM) are enabled, meaning it doesn't necessarily slow down performance. The main difference between using the GUI and running QEMU manually is convenience; the core efficiency of accessing hardware through QEMU remains the same.

In summary, the QEMU-GUI helps to streamline the setup of VMs but doesn’t affect the underlying performance compared to manually running QEMU commands.

It may have some limitations, but it comes with basic commands.

[JusGellin]

@josejp2424
Thanks for the great explanation for this.

I didn't realize the kvm part would make it directly access the hardware.

I've really enjoyed using virt-manager for doing this. Sometimes I'm running 2 or 3 vms to compare them.
Is the QEMU-GUI similar?

I'll dig into trying it out. I was hoping to find something on the internet that would show me more how to use it, but don't see much about it.

Thanks

[josejp2424]

@josejp2424
Thanks for the great explanation for this.

I didn't realize the kvm part would make it directly access the hardware.

I've really enjoyed using virt-manager for doing this. Sometimes I'm running 2 or 3 vms to compare them.
Is the QEMU-GUI similar?

I'll dig into trying it out. I was hoping to find something on the internet that would show me more how to use it, but don't see much about it.

Thanks

You won't find much information because this GUI was made by a user for Puppy Linux. I don't remember if it was @01micko .

[Clarity]

hello @JusGellin and @josejp2424

I seem to remember that "qemu_gui" is in every WoofCE PUP for several years; including this from BKWP64 v1008s. This utilty preceeds any added installation of QEMU to the running system.

To my knowledge, no developer has included the full QEMU packaging OOTB in their distros.

Here's what WoofCE distros see in a pristine booted system:

qemu GUI.jpg (4.72 KiB) Viewed 247 times

[josejp2424]

hello @JusGellin and @josejp2424

I seem to remember that "qemu_gui" is in every WoofCE PUP for several years; including this from BKWP64 v1008s. This utilty preceeds any added installation of QEMU to the running system.

To my knowledge, no developer has included the full QEMU packaging OOTB in their distros.

Here's what WoofCE distros see in a pristine booted system:qemu GUI.jpg

You're right @Clarity .
It's in the woof-ce.