Attaching USB storage via XOA

rlyons20

@olivierlambert unfortunately, I can't get the xe pusb-list command to return my USB devices, even though I see them with dmesg.

So, I may have bigger problems here...

rlyons20

@rlyons20 soooo... xe pusb-list only exposes STORAGE devices. I verified by plugging in a USB thumb drive, and that shows up.

So, my use case of running HomeAssistant as a VM with Zigbee/Zwave USB devices is probably dead in the water.

That's disappointing...

olivierlambert

You might modify the filter to get your dongle detected

gpoole

I wrote a script to set up USB device passthrough for a specific device by name to a specific VM by name in the same basic way the XCP-ng Centre UI does it when you follow the steps described in the original post. Here's the script: https://gist.github.com/gpoole/c89807e9de9cb5c87bbcc2da27e0c3e4

Are those the commands you're looking for @olivierlambert?

Either way hopefully useful to anyone who wants to do this without using XCP-ng Centre. I've found it needs to be done every boot, so the script is intended to be something I can quickly SSH in and run. I'm sure it could be automated properly but works for me.

olivierlambert

Thanks for the commands. I just find it weird you need to do it at each boot, I don't remember having to do it here

EyesUnclouded

@gpoole Thank you! I'm sure this will be quite useful in my homelab, but maybe not at work just yet... particularly because I am hopeful Olivier and Vates are able to integrate this into XOA.

This is because I am looking into integrating at least one HSM into our xcp-ng infrastructure, and the $650 USB-A YubiHSM2 is quite attractive. It would be great to be able to reliably pass this through via XOA to a Windows Server VM. I could imagine this use case being potentially important for small-medium sized companies looking for alternatives to typical expensive HSMs.

cyrus104

@xenoNfluX @olivierlambert

I would agree this would be great for the Z-wave/Zigbee dongles in Home Automation.

Right now I'm working on a small homelab that can pass through the intel Quicksync to a Plex server and the USB to support HA.

Having this in XOA/XOCE, even XO-lite (understandably not really a "lite" feature).

Ethan6123

I am also interested in this feature.

We use XCP-NG to run the virtual hosts in our DMZ. As you can imagine, the DMZ is completely separated from our internal network and the only way to transfer a file to a virtual server is to physically connect a usb drive to a host.

We use Xen Orchestra for everything except this. When we need to mount a USB drive we have to physically connect a laptop to the DMZ network and then attach the USB drive with XCP-NG Center.

SpoonyLove

@cyrus104 @olivierlambert I'm also interested in USB support, and specifically USB dongle connectivity for HomeAsssistant.

@olivierlambert , you mentioned filter modification. is that at the xen level? Similar to many, i'm at the beginner level- I'm willing to tackle a problem or provide specification for further development, but i'm not sure where to start.

SpoonyLove

@SpoonyLove

Found some resources that answered my own question. For the sake of future google searches, please redirect my question to:

https://psychogun.github.io/docs/xcp-ng/USB-passthrough/

gn_ro

@SpoonyLove @olivierlambert
For usb passthrough we are using USB redirector over network
For anything storage related we use something like this:

mkdir /adm/passSR

passUUID=`xe sr-create name-label="Direct access SR" name-description="Direct acces to hdd with simlink" type=udev content-type=disk device-config:location=/adm/passSR`

ln -s /dev/sdb /adm/passSR/sdb

xe sr-scan uuid=$passUUID
xe vdi-list sr-uuid=$passUUID

Remember to replace /dev/sdb with your device.