banger/README.md

banger

Minimal Firecracker launcher.

Requirements

• Linux host with KVM (/dev/kvm access)
• sudo, ip, curl, ssh, jq
• dmsetup, losetup, blockdev (device-mapper snapshot for rootfs)
• e2cp, e2rm (writes hostname and resolv.conf into rootfs snapshot)

Files

• firecracker: Firecracker binary
• wtf/root/boot/vmlinux-6.8.0-94-generic: guest kernel
• wtf/root/boot/initrd.img-6.8.0-94-generic: guest initrd
• wtf/root/lib/modules/6.8.0-94-generic/: guest kernel modules
• rootfs.ext4: guest root filesystem (base image if present)
• rootfs-docker.ext4: docker-ready guest rootfs (built via make-rootfs.sh)
• packages.apt: apt packages baked into rebuilt guest images
• id_ed25519: SSH key for root
• mapdns: local DNS mapping CLI used to publish <vm-name>.vm → guest IP records

Run

./run.sh

Run Options

./run.sh --name calm-otter --vcpu 4 --ram 2048 --overlay-size 12G

• --name: must be unique and match [a-z0-9][a-z0-9-]{0,63}.
• --vcpu: defaults to 2, max 16.
• --ram: MiB, defaults to 1024, max 32768.
• --overlay-size: writable dm-snapshot size for VM changes under /, including /root and /var (default: 8G).
• --rootfs: path to the rootfs image (default: ./rootfs-docker.ext4).
• --kernel: path to the kernel image (default: ./wtf/root/boot/vmlinux-6.8.0-94-generic).
• --initrd: path to the initrd image (default: ./wtf/root/boot/initrd.img-6.8.0-94-generic).

Storage Layout

• rootfs.ext4 is used as the read-only origin for a per-VM device-mapper snapshot mounted as /.
• Each VM gets one sparse writable overlay file (cow.ext4) that stores its changes on top of the shared base image.
• /root and /var live inside that per-VM overlay, so VMs can install packages without copying separate disks per VM.
• run.sh masks stale home.mount and var.mount units at boot so older images with /dev/vdb and /dev/vdc entries in /etc/fstab still boot.
• /run and /tmp should be tmpfs via /etc/fstab.

SSH

ssh -i "./id_ed25519" root@<guest_ip>

Shortcut:

./ssh.sh <vm-name-or-ip>

VM DNS

• Spawned VMs register <vm-name>.vm → guest IP through mapdns set.
• VM teardown removes the mapping through mapdns rm.
• mapdns writes to /home/thales/.local/share/mapdns/records.json.

Internet Access

VMs do not get internet access by default. You must enable forwarding and NAT:

./nat.sh up <id-or-name-prefix>

This enables net.ipv4.ip_forward=1 and installs per-VM NAT rules for the VM's guest IP and TAP device. To remove rules:

./nat.sh down <id-or-name-prefix>

Check status with:

./nat.sh status <id-or-name-prefix>

Shutdown

reboot

Customize Rootfs (Docker + Kernel Modules)

Use customize.sh to build a writable rootfs with Docker and kernel modules preloaded so Docker works out of the box. Pass the base rootfs as a positional argument; the output defaults to docker-<base filename> in the same directory unless you pass --out.

Base guest packages come from ./packages.apt. Edit that file to bake tools like vim and tmux into rebuilt images.

./customize.sh ./rootfs.ext4 --size 6G --docker

Options:

• --size: optional size for the output image.
• --kernel: kernel path (default: ./wtf/root/boot/vmlinux-6.8.0-94-generic).
• --initrd: initrd path (default: ./wtf/root/boot/initrd.img-6.8.0-94-generic).
• --modules: kernel modules directory (default: ./wtf/root/lib/modules/6.8.0-94-generic).
• --docker: install Docker packages into the image.
• --out: output rootfs path (default: docker-<base filename>).

After boot, enable NAT and validate Docker:

./nat.sh up <id-or-name-prefix>
ssh -i "./id_ed25519" root@<guest_ip> "systemctl enable --now docker"
ssh -i "./id_ed25519" root@<guest_ip> "docker run --rm hello-world"

Build Rootfs On Demand

run.sh defaults to ./rootfs-docker.ext4. If it is missing, run.sh will invoke make-rootfs.sh to build it.

./make-rootfs.sh

make-rootfs.sh chooses the first available base image:

• ./rootfs.ext4

If ./packages.apt changes after rootfs-docker.ext4 is built, run.sh will warn and keep using the existing image. make-rootfs.sh will also warn and exit without rebuilding while the image already exists.

To rebuild after package changes:

rm -f ./rootfs-docker.ext4 ./rootfs-docker.ext4.packages.sha256
./make-rootfs.sh

Interactive Customization

To create a writable copy and customize it manually over SSH (no automatic package/config changes), use:

./interactive.sh ./rootfs-docker.ext4

You can override the output path:

./interactive.sh ./rootfs-docker.ext4 --out ./my-rootfs.ext4

VM Info File

Each VM writes:

• state/vms/<id>/vm.json: local metadata under .meta plus the raw Firecracker config under .config.

Log Notes

• PCI: Fatal: No config space access function found and MissingAddressRange lines are expected with pci=off in run.sh.
• SELinux: Could not open policy file ... is expected in the minimal rootfs.