Running multiple containers with full ChromeOS integration

[Bill Wood]

I'd like to have separate containers for separate projects.

In this video, Zach Reizner says that its possible to run multiple containers as first class citizens of the UI integration:

https://youtu.be/WwrXqDERFm8?t=44m22s

However I can't figure out how to do it from the UI, and my attempts to run another container copied from penguin haven't worked well either.  I've been able to get Chrome browser integration working, but not Files integration or app integration in the launcher.

Does anyone know how to do this?

[Mike Frysinger]

it is not supported via the UI and most likely never will be

you'll need to use crosh + vmc to get into existing VMs and run/name your own containers

-mike

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[Keith I Myers]

Would it be possible to eventually see a local API to allow applications to be written that can create/manage Virtual Machines? - of course some restrictions should be in place for "Termina"

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[Mike Frysinger]

i don't think anyone has proposed this before.  it's not outside the realm of possibility, but probably unlikely to happen this year.

feel free to file a bug at crbug.com/new with the proposal.

-mike

[Bill Wood]

I've made several attempts to do it by creating my own containers, including renaming my penguin, then creating a new one through Terminal, then renaming the new one to something else and renaming the old penguin back to penguin.  When I ran the new non-penguin container it totally confused Files and Launcher because the container was still bind mounted to the original penguin's bind mounts for ssh keys and container token.

The issue seems to be how to launch my second container with the correct ssh keys and container token so that Files and the Launcher integrate my second container into the UI properly.  From the video it appears that Launcher should show apps from both penguin and the second container if this is done properly.  Is this possible?

[Mike Frysinger]

officially, the only automatic integration we plan on supporting is the VM named "termina" with a container named "penguin".  if you want to create other VMs/containers, you're certainly free to, but it's up to you to trigger things like mounting of those other containers or integrating the services we've provided or configuring keys/ssh access as the rest of the system expects.  e.g. garcon and such are required in order to automatically integrate desktop files into the launcher.  our docs cover this a bit more, but we don't currently have docs for power users to integrate the services themselves.  at this point, the code is the manual.  this should improve over time, but it isn't a priority for this year.

but if something breaks, our response generally is going to be "does it work with the default Terminal/penguin container?", and people would have to do more investigation on their side to see where the problem lies.  or submit CLs to fix the problem :).

yes, if you rename "penguin" to something else, i can easily see the system getting confused.  i think our answer would basically be "don't do that".

as time goes on, we'll probably expand test coverage to make sure some level of basic service works with differently named VMs/containers.

-mike

[Mike Frysinger]

sorry, i don't mean to sound all doom & gloom.  we're still at a pretty nascent stage and are chasing down a lot of low hanging fruit to make the official Crostini flow as smooth as possible.  we're trying not to block other flows, but we simply don't have the resources available currently to officially support them.  it's the conflict between making a polished official product we can put a brand behind and a rough tech demo that we only let other hackers play around with.

-mike

[Bill Wood]

Thanks Mike.  I understand, although I was hoping for a pointer or two on how I could "hack" this.  :)

[Bill Wood]

Hey Mike, looks like the new "vmc container" command does some of what I want :)

Trying it, I get launcher integration but still no Files integration.  Is that planned?

[Mike Frysinger]

automatic Files integration only works with the default named VM/container.  if you want to connect other containers, you can use Secure Shell's SFTP mounting.

-mike

[Bill Wood]

People are also using vmc share (see here)