Merging upstream version 256.

Signed-off-by: Daniel Baumann <daniel.baumann@progress-linux.org>

1 files changed, 54 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/docs/VM_INTERFACE.md b/docs/VM_INTERFACE.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..abe7067
--- /dev/null
+++ b/docs/VM_INTERFACE.md
@@ -0,0 +1,54 @@
+---
+title: VM Interface
+category: Interfaces
+layout: default
+SPDX-License-Identifier: LGPL-2.1-or-later
+---
+
+# The VM Interface
+
+Also consult [Writing Virtual Machine or Container
+Managers](https://systemd.io/WRITING_VM_AND_CONTAINER_MANAGERS).
+
+systemd has a number of interfaces for interacting with virtual machine
+managers, when systemd is used inside of a VM. If you work on a VM manager,
+please consider supporting the following interfaces.
+
+1. systemd supports passing immutable binary data blobs with limited size and
+   restricted access to services via the `ImportCredential=`, `LoadCredential=`
+   and `SetCredential=` settings. These credentials may be passed into a system
+   via SMBIOS Type 11 vendor strings, see
+   [systemd(1)](https://www.freedesktop.org/software/systemd/man/latest/systemd.html)
+   for details. This concept may be used to flexibly configure various facets
+   ot the guest system. See
+   [systemd.system-credentials(7)](https://www.freedesktop.org/software/systemd/man/latest/systemd.system-credentials.html)
+   for a list of system credentials implemented by various systemd components.
+
+2. Readiness, information about various system properties and functionality, as
+   well as progress of boot may be reported by systemd to a machine manager via
+   the `sd_notify()` protocol via `AF_VSOCK` sockets. The address of this
+   socket may be configured via the `vmm.notify_socket` system credential. See
+   [systemd(1)](https://www.freedesktop.org/software/systemd/man/latest/systemd.html).
+
+3. The
+   [systemd-ssh-generator(8)](https://www.freedesktop.org/software/systemd/man/latest/systemd-ssh-generator.html)
+   functionality will automatically bind SSH login functionality to `AF_VSOCK`
+   port 22, if the system runs in a VM.
+
+4. If not initialized yet the system's
+   [machine-id(5)](https://www.freedesktop.org/software/systemd/man/latest/machine-id.html)
+   is automatically set to the SMBIOS product UUID if available and invocation
+   in an VM environment is detected.
+
+5. The
+   [`systemd-boot(7)`](https://www.freedesktop.org/software/systemd/man/latest/systemd-boot.html)
+   and
+   [`systemd-stub(7)`](https://www.freedesktop.org/software/systemd/man/latest/systemd-stub.html)
+   components support two SMBIOS Type 11 vendor strings that may be used to
+   extend the kernel command line of booted Linux environments:
+   `io.systemd.stub.kernel-cmdline-extra=` and
+   `io.systemd.boot.kernel-cmdline-extra=`.
+
+Also see
+[smbios-type-11(7)](https://www.freedesktop.org/software/systemd/man/latest/smbios-type-11.html)
+for a list of supported SMBIOS Type 11 vendor strings.