A CLI/GUI tool for managing virtual machines on Apple Silicon Macs using Apple's Virtualization.framework.

• macOS and Linux guests — Create macOS VMs from IPSW restore images or Linux VMs from ISO installers
• Full lifecycle management — Create, start, stop, list, and delete VMs
• GUI and headless modes — Display VM output in a native window or use serial console via stdin/stdout
• NAT and bridged networking — NAT by default, or bridge to a host interface
• Resource validation — CPU, memory, and disk constraints enforced against host capabilities
• Sparse disk images — APFS-efficient RAW images that only consume space as data is written
• Cross-process control — Stop a running VM from any terminal via PID-based signaling
• Swift 6 concurrency — Full Sendable compliance with @MainActor isolation for Virtualization.framework

• macOS 14.0 (Sonoma) or later
• Apple Silicon (M1 or later)
• Xcode Command Line Tools or Xcode (for building)
• Code signing with virtualization entitlements (handled by make sign)

# Build and install
make release && make sign
sudo make install

# Create a Linux VM
darwinvm create ubuntu --type linux --iso ~/Downloads/ubuntu-24.04-live-server-arm64.iso \
    --cpu 4 --mem 8 --disk 32

# Start the VM (GUI window)
darwinvm start ubuntu

# Start headless (serial console)
darwinvm start ubuntu --headless

# Stop the VM (from another terminal)
darwinvm stop ubuntu

# List all VMs
darwinvm list

# Delete a VM
darwinvm delete ubuntu

# Debug build
make build

# Release build (optimized)
make release

# Codesign with entitlements (required for VM operations)
make sign

# Install to /usr/local/bin
sudo make install

# Run tests
make test

# Clean build artifacts
make clean

You can also build directly with Swift Package Manager:

swift build
swift build -c release
swift test

Note: The binary must be codesigned with the entitlements in darwinvm.entitlements before it can create or run VMs. Use make sign after building.

See docs/cli.md for the complete CLI reference.

darwinvm <subcommand>

SUBCOMMANDS:
  create    Create a new virtual machine
  start     Start a virtual machine
  stop      Stop a running virtual machine
  list      List all virtual machines
  delete    Delete a virtual machine

DarwinVM wraps Apple's Virtualization.framework in a convenient CLI. Each VM is stored as a directory under ~/.darwinvm/vms/<name>/ containing its configuration, disk image, and platform-specific files.

• macOS VMs use VZMacOSBootLoader, VZMacPlatformConfiguration, and install from IPSW restore images via VZMacOSInstaller
• Linux VMs use VZEFIBootLoader, VZGenericPlatformConfiguration, and boot from ISO images attached as block devices

VMs run as foreground processes. In GUI mode, a native NSWindow hosts a VZVirtualMachineView. In headless mode, the serial console is wired to stdin/stdout. Cross-process stop works by sending SIGTERM to the PID recorded in the VM's lockfile.

See LICENSE for details.