The <data> Tag

Each <data> section contains a description of an object pertinent to the command specified. The format of the data section is based on the XML schema portion of the Open Virtualization Format (OVF) draft specification. That schema defines an <Envelope> section which contains a <References> tag (unused by LDoms) and <Content> and <Section> sections.

For LDoms, the <Content> section is used to identify and describe a particular domain. The domain name in the id= attribute of the <Content> node identifies the domain. Within the <Content> section are one or more <Section> sections describing resources of the domain as needed by the particular command.

If you only need to identify a domain name, then you do not need to use any <Section> tags. Conversely, if no domain identifier is needed for the command, then you do need to provide a <Section> section, describing the resources needed for the command, outside of a <Content> section, but still within the <Envelope> section.

A <data> section does not need to contain an <Envelope> tag in cases where the object information can be inferred. This situation mainly applies to requests for monitoring all objects applicable to an action, and event registration and unregistration requests.

To allow use of the OVF specification's schema to properly define all types of objects, two additional OVF types have been defined:

• <gprop:GenericProperty> tag (See The GenericProperty XML Schema.)

• <Binding> tag (See Binding_Type XML Schema.)

The <gprop:GenericProperty> tag was defined to handle any object's property for which the OVF specification does not have a definition. The property name is defined in the key= attribute of the node and the value of the property is the contents of the node. The <binding> tag is used in the list-bindings subcommand output to define resources that are bound to other resources.