Setting Up a Home Assistant Virtual Machine with Cockpit on OpenMediaVault

Install Cockpit

apt-get install cockpit

Install Cockpit application to manage virtual machines

apt-get install cockpit-machines

Install Virtual Viewer to be able to view virtual machines

apt-get install virt-viewer

Install KVM Packages

apt-get install -y qemu qemu-kvm libvirt-daemon libvirt-clients bridge-utils virt-manager

Install OVMF Package

apt-get install ovmf

Enable and start Libvirtd

systemctl enable libvirtd
systemctl start libvirtd
systemctl status libvirtd

Use the command bellow to check if the KVM module is loaded.

lsmod | grep -i kvm

Setting up KVM Bridge

To bring up the network interfaces, execute the “ip a” command.

“eth0” will be used to bridge to the LAN.

To modify the bridge.conf file, use the following command:

nano /etc/sysctl.d/bridge.conf

Inside the bridge.conf file, insert these three lines:

net.bridge.bridge-nf-call-ip6tables=0
net.bridge.bridge-nf-call-iptables=0
net.bridge.bridge-nf-call-arptables=0

Afterwards, create a configuration file for the provided rules to become effective:

nano /etc/udev/rules.d/99-bridge.rules

Insert this line inside the 99-bridge.rules

		ACTION=="add", SUBSYSTEM=="module", KERNEL=="br_netfilter", RUN+="/sbin/sysctl -p /etc/sysctl.d/bridge.conf"

Create the Netplan Configuration File by using the following command:

nano /etc/netplan/00-installer-config.yaml

Add this configuration inside the yaml file.

network:
  ethernets:
    eth0:
      dhcp4: false
      dhcp6: false
  bridges:
    br0:
      interfaces: [eth0]
      addresses: [192.168.1.160/24] #This can be any IP address
      gateway4: 192.168.1.1
      mtu: 1500
      nameservers:
        addresses: [8.8.8.8, 1.1.1.1]
      parameters:
        stp: true
        forward-delay: 4
      dhcp4: no
      dhcp6: no

  version: 2

Reboot the machine, and after the reboot, execute the ‘ip a’ command. You should now be able to observe the ‘br0’ bridge. Additionally, running ‘brctl show br0’ will provide information about the ‘br0’ bridge, and you can find ‘eth0’ listed under its interfaces.

Next, configure the KVM to use the bridge network. Create an XML file by running the nano command and input the bridge configuration details as shown below:

nano host-bridge.xml

Enter the following configuration in the xml file:

<network>
		  <name>host-bridge</name>
		  <forward mode="bridge"/>
		  <bridge name="br0"/>
		</network>

To utilize the freshly established bridge with KVM,execute the following command:

Defines a new virtual network with specified settings from ‘host-bridge.xml’.

virsh net-define host-bridge.xml

Starts the ‘host-bridge’ virtual network for use by virtual machines.

virsh net-start host-bridge

Configures the ‘host-bridge’ network to start automatically at system boot.

virsh net-autostart host-bridge

Lists all virtual networks, displaying their statuses and names, including both active and inactive networks

virsh net-list --all

Home Assistant VM Setup

Start by downloading the Home Assistant Image directly onto the host machine.

Visit the following URL: https://www.home-assistant.io/installation/alternative

Locate the link for KVM/Proxmox on that page and use the “wget” command to download the image. Save it to the directory “/var/lib/libvirt/images/”. Here’s the command:

sudo wget https://github.com/home-assistant/operating-system/releases/download/10.5/haos_ova-10.5.qcow2.xz -P /var/lib/libvirt/images/

Once the image is downloaded, it needs to be extracted. Navigate to the directory where you downloaded the image and execute the extraction command. If the required software is not already installed, you can install it with the following command:

sudo apt install xz-utils

Extract the downloaded image using this command:

cd /var/lib/libvirt/images/
unxz haos_ova-10.5.qcow2.xz

After successfully extracting the image, access the Cockpit interface.

In Cockpit, go to “Virtual Machines” and select “Import VM.”

Enter the Home Assistant details.
Specify the path where you extracted the Home Assistant Image.
Choose a random operating system (as the specific OS isn’t critical for this task).
Make sure to uncheck the option that prevents the VM from starting immediately

Return to the SSH session and proceed to edit the VM by executing the following command to edit its template:

virsh edit "Home_Assistant"

Replace “Home_Assistant” with the actual name of your VM if it differs from the one used here.

In the configuration file of the VM find the “OS” line and insert the following lines:

<loader readonly="yes" type="pflash">/usr/share/OVMF/OVMF_CODE.fd</loader>
<nvram>/var/lib/libvirt/qemu/nvram/hassio_VARS.fd</nvram>

Return to the Cockpit interface, choose the Home Assistant VM, and click the “Run” button. After a brief moment, it should begin loading.

Once Home Assistant has completed loading, you will observe the assigned IP address along with the remaining details.

https://community.home-assistant.io/t/installation-on-opensuse-kvm-fails/583153

https://community.home-assistant.io/t/ha-os-installation-fails-on-uefi-in-qemu-kvm/435509

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYtWZKfrPgM