KVM/qemu - use LVM volumes directly without image file?

1. qemu-kvm can use LVs as virtual disks instead of files. this is quite a common use case actually.
2. libguestfs (and just look for a set of virt-* tools) can provide access to guest filesystems in a cleaner way than anything you remount to the host directly, though both are possible.
3. Online FS resizing is not a feature of kvm, but something the guest OS should be capable of. resize2fs will work in a VM as well as it does on physical hardware, the only problem being the guest redetecting the size changes. Try virt-resize as the standard tool, but lvresize and qemu-img can also easily be used (though in offline mode, requiring a guest restart usually).

I think lvresize with resize2fs will actually work without a guest restart, but I haven't tried it yet

I use qemu-kvm+libvirt with exactly the configuration you're asking about, for the reasons you listed, but additionally because I get much better performance without the KVM host's filesystem layer in scope. If you add the VG as a 'storage pool' in virt-manager, you can create such VMs using its user-friendly wizard. (But I just write the XML by hand these days using an existing VM as a template).

Here's sanitised output of 'virsh dumpxml' for one of my guests:

<domain type='kvm'>
  <name>somevm</name>
  <uuid>f173d3b5-704c-909e-b597-c5a823ad48c9</uuid>
  <description>Windows Server 2008 R2</description>
  <memory unit='KiB'>4194304</memory>
  <currentMemory unit='KiB'>4194304</currentMemory>
  <vcpu placement='static'>2</vcpu>
  <os>
    <type arch='x86_64' machine='pc-1.1'>hvm</type>
    <boot dev='hd'/>
  </os>
  <features>
    <acpi/>
    <apic/>
    <pae/>
  </features>
  <cpu mode='custom' match='exact'>
    <model fallback='allow'>Nehalem</model>
    <vendor>Intel</vendor>
    <feature policy='require' name='tm2'/>
    <feature policy='require' name='est'/>
    <feature policy='require' name='monitor'/>
    <feature policy='require' name='smx'/>
    <feature policy='require' name='ss'/>
    <feature policy='require' name='vme'/>
    <feature policy='require' name='dtes64'/>
    <feature policy='require' name='rdtscp'/>
    <feature policy='require' name='ht'/>
    <feature policy='require' name='ds'/>
    <feature policy='require' name='pbe'/>
    <feature policy='require' name='tm'/>
    <feature policy='require' name='pdcm'/>
    <feature policy='require' name='vmx'/>
    <feature policy='require' name='ds_cpl'/>
    <feature policy='require' name='xtpr'/>
    <feature policy='require' name='acpi'/>
  </cpu>
  <clock offset='localtime'/>
  <on_poweroff>destroy</on_poweroff>
  <on_reboot>restart</on_reboot>
  <on_crash>restart</on_crash>
  <devices>
    <emulator>/usr/bin/kvm</emulator>
    <disk type='block' device='disk'>
      <driver name='qemu' type='raw'/>
      <source dev='/dev/vg1/somevm'/>
      <target dev='hda' bus='virtio'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x06' function='0x0'/>
    </disk>
    <disk type='file' device='cdrom'>
      <driver name='qemu' type='raw'/>
      <target dev='hdc' bus='ide'/>
      <readonly/>
      <address type='drive' controller='0' bus='1' target='0' unit='0'/>
    </disk>
    <controller type='usb' index='0'>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x01' function='0x2'/>
    </controller>
    <controller type='ide' index='0'>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x01' function='0x1'/>
    </controller>
    <controller type='pci' index='0' model='pci-root'/>
    <interface type='bridge'>
      <mac address='00:00:00:00:00:00'/>
      <source bridge='br0'/>
      <model type='virtio'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x04' function='0x0'/>
    </interface>
    <serial type='pty'>
      <target port='0'/>
    </serial>
    <console type='pty'>
      <target type='serial' port='0'/>
    </console>
    <input type='tablet' bus='usb'/>
    <input type='mouse' bus='ps2'/>
    <input type='keyboard' bus='ps2'/>
    <graphics type='vnc' port='-1' autoport='yes'/>
    <video>
      <model type='vga' vram='9216' heads='1'/>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x02' function='0x0'/>
    </video>
    <memballoon model='virtio'>
      <address type='pci' domain='0x0000' bus='0x00' slot='0x03' function='0x0'/>
    </memballoon>
  </devices>
  <seclabel type='none' model='none'/>
</domain>

Another thought (not relevant to your question but it might help): if you can, make sure you're using the 'paravirtualised' network, block, random, clock etc drivers - they're significantly faster than the fully virtualised ones. This is the "model=virtio" stuff above. You have to load driver modules into the host's kernel such as virtio_net.

Here is output of 'virsh pool-dumpxml vg1':

<pool type='logical'>
  <name>vg1</name>
  <uuid>9e26648e-64bc-9221-835f-140f6def0556</uuid>
  <capacity unit='bytes'>3000613470208</capacity>
  <allocation unit='bytes'>1824287358976</allocation>
  <available unit='bytes'>1176326111232</available>
  <source>
    <device path='/dev/md1'/>
    <name>vg1</name>
    <format type='lvm2'/>
  </source>
  <target>
    <path>/dev/vg1</path>
    <permissions>
      <mode>0700</mode>
    </permissions>
  </target>
</pool>

I don’t know of a way of exactly replicating the Xen behaviour you describe. However, you can use kpartx to expose the partitions within an LV that contains a whole-disk image as block devices on the host, which you can then mount, etc.

See my answer to my own question on this issue at KVM booting off-image kernel and existing partition. In short, getting virt-install to create a config for this is pretty straight-forward, given a slight modification of guest /etc/fstab.