[Qemu-devel] plugins

[Hetz Ben Hamo]

> There is already a plugin system. It requires you to recompile everytime
> you add a new piece of hardware, though. I don't think this is a problem
> as most likely you will have to recompile anyway to make sure the plugin
> uses the same header files as qemu's core.

Yes, but this plugin method is not very usefull for 3rd party plugins..

Many people don't realize one thing about QEMU which differs it from ANY 
other emulator: For the first time, you can create a "hardware card", 
write drivers for it and test it on guest OS's (Windows, Linux, *BSD, 
etc) and test it on other platforms (PPC, Sparc, ARM, once their core is 
matured).

Think about it: You can create a new PCI card without buying those all 
expensive software to simulate it, write drivers to test it and if it 
works well for your customer(s), you can do the real PCI card! Go try 
that with VMWare (you can't), BOCHS (good luck hacking their code, and 
see the speed difference), and I'm not even mentioning PPC, ARM or Sparc...

With a plugin system (all it takes is 2 files: an text/XML file which 
contains the info on this plugin, and a .so file which is the plugin 
itself) both closed source and open source developers can add lots of 
hardware to QEMU which can be used for driver development on Linux and 
on Windows (as well other guest OS's) without having the real hardware.

Have you ever thought to write driver for Linux for some hardware (which 
someone can writes a plugin) without having it? now you (potentially) can..

Just my thoughts...
Thanks,
Hetz