Migratiing from legacy openvz host to Proxmox

[MH_MUC]

Hello everyone,

we are using openvz containers for years now, but I'd like to switch to Proxmox for serveral reasons (e.g. cheaper than virtuozzo, webinterface, etc.)

I know that 2.6 kernel VMs are not supported anymore. So I would have to restore an openvz backup and migrate to LXC in one step? Is that possible?
I wouldn't want to install an outdated proxmox just to get openvz support.

Thanks for your help!

 

[oguz]

hi!

I know that 2.6 kernel VMs are not supported anymore. So I would have to restore an openvz backup and migrate to LXC in one step? Is that possible?

check out this article[0] on our wiki. most if not all the information you need should be on there.

[0]: https://pve.proxmox.com/wiki/Convert_OpenVZ_to_LXC

 

[MH_MUC]

Dear oguz,

thank you for the reply.
I guess I didn't ask precisely.

The source host is not running any proxmox. Just plain openvz.

I read the wiki-entry you posted, but here is my question. Can I use pct restore to restore an openvz-backup that hasn't been created by a proxmox-host?

Thanks.

 

[oguz]

ah.. i see now.
you can try taking backups from your old host and restoring them in proxmox. but there's not guarantee it'll work.
it actually depends on the backup/container. i've seen a case where ploop was being used and it wasn't able to be restored in proxmox (since we didn't support ploop).

one workaround is to just:
* mount your openvz container
* create a tar archive out of it
* restore in proxmox

which should work most of the time.

 

[Stoiko Ivanov]

If the backing store of the openvz is 'ploop' then no. If it's 'simfs' you could try - else - as @oguz said - mount it and create a tar-archive

 

[MH_MUC]

Ok and what do I do with the tar-archive? Just create a new CT and overwrite the files?

 

[Stoiko Ivanov]

Ok and what do I do with the tar-archive? Just create a new CT and overwrite the files?

You could try that..
create a fresh ct (as close to the one you're trying to restore - e.g. same distribution...)
`pct mount $CTID`
then replace all the content with the ones from the tarball
`pct umount $CTID`

and then try to start it.
If it does not work - check the debug logs as described in the reference documentation:
https://pve.proxmox.com/pve-docs/chapter-pct.html#_obtaining_debugging_logs

I hope this helps!