DVM

A small Bash wrapper around Lima for disposable development VMs. It creates and starts Lima instances, keeps host files out of the guest, creates a dev user, and runs your own setup scripts. Tool installation lives in those scripts.

Defaults:

• no host mounts
• VM <name> maps to Lima instance dvm-<name>
• code lives at /home/<user>/code/<vm>
• config in ~/.config/dvm
• setup scripts are ownership/permission checked before they run

Install

Requirements: Bash and Lima 2.0+.

git clone <repo-url> dvm
cd dvm
./install.sh          # symlinks bin/dvm into ~/.local/bin (override with PREFIX)

Quickstart

dvm new app           # writes ~/.config/dvm/vms/app/{config.sh,setup.sh}

Edit the config:

# ~/.config/dvm/vms/app/config.sh
DVM_CPUS=4
DVM_MEMORY=8
DVM_DISK=60
DVM_PORTS=(3000:3000 5173:5173)

Edit the setup script:

# ~/.config/dvm/vms/app/setup.sh
#!/usr/bin/env bash
set -Eeuo pipefail

sudo dnf5 install -y git ripgrep fd-find tmux

Build and enter:

DVM_DRY_RUN=1 dvm sync app   # preview, no Lima contact
dvm sync app
dvm sh app

Commands

dvm sync <vm> | --all
dvm sh <vm>
dvm ssh <vm> -- cmd...
dvm cp <src> <dst>
dvm ls [--only-config] [<vm>]
dvm stop <vm> | --all [--only-config]
dvm rm <vm> --yes [--config]
dvm new <vm>
dvm version

See docs/commands.md for details.

Docs

• docs/commands.md - command reference
• docs/config.md - config variables and setup scripts
• docs/security.md - security model and threats
• docs/lima.md - Lima behavior and limits
• docs/troubleshooting.md - errors and recovery
• examples/ - copy/paste setup snippets

Development check (runs the smoke test and ShellCheck):

bash scripts/check