Managing virtual machine state

Managing virtual machine state

From the Administration Website, you can gain access to a number of options for controlling a virtual machine, as described in the following table. You can gain access to these options from the Master Status page, by pointing to the name of the virtual machine to manage. In addition, when you are on a configuration page for a virtual machine, you can find the control options under the Control Virtual Machine section of the navigation pane. The options that display depend upon the current state of the virtual machine; some of these options are available only from the Master Status Page and do not appear in the Control Virtual Machine section.

Item Description

Edit Configuration

Displays the configuration page for the virtual machine.

Remote Control

Takes you to Remote Control view for the virtual machine. This gives you access to the operating system and applications running on the virtual machine.

Turn On

Starts the virtual machine.

Pause

Stops the virtual machine without discarding memory.

Resume

Resumes a paused virtual machine.

Save State

Saves the current state of the virtual machine, and stops the virtual machine from running. This creates a temporary file in the same location as the virtual machine configuration files with a .vsv extension that contains state information. When the virtual machine is restored from the saved state, it returns to the condition that it was in when its state was saved.

Warning

Do not use saved states on a virtual machine configured as a domain controller. Problems may occur with replication because you can revert the virtual machine to an earlier state.

Save State and Commit Undo Disks

Saves the current state of the virtual machine, merges the undo disk with the parent, and stops the virtual machine from running. Saving state creates a temporary file in the same location as the virtual machine configuration files with a .vsv extension that contains state information. When the virtual machine is restored from the saved state, it returns to the condition that it was in when its state was saved.

Save State and Keep Undo Disks

Saves the current state of the virtual machine, keeps the undo disk, and stops the virtual machine from running. This creates a temporary file in the same location as the virtual machine configuration files with a .vsv extension that contains state information. When the virtual machine is restored from the saved state, it returns to the condition that it was in when its state was saved.

Shut Down Guest OS

Shuts down the guest operating system.

Shut Down Guest OS and Keep Undo Disks

Shuts down the guest operating system and keeps the undo disk.

Shut Down Guest OS and Commit Undo Disks

Shuts down the guest operating system and merges the undo disk with the parent disk.

Turn Off

Turns off the virtual machine without saving any state information. This action has the same effect on the virtual machine as does pulling the plug on a physical computer.

Turn Off Virtual Machine and Keep Undo Disks

Turns off the virtual machine without saving any state information, and keeps the undo disk. This action has the same effect on the virtual machine as does pulling the plug on a physical computer without deleting undo disks.

Turn Off Virtual Machine and Commit Undo Disks

Turns off the virtual machine without saving any state information, and merges the undo disk with the parent disk. This action has the same effect on the virtual machine as does pulling the plug on a physical computer.

Turn Off Virtual Machine and Discard Undo Disks

Turns off the virtual machine, discards the undo disk, and does not save any state information. This action has the same effect on the virtual machine as does pulling the plug on a physical computer. When the virtual machine is turned on again, a new empty undo disk is created. For more information, see Using Undo Disks.

Reset

Resets the virtual machine.

Restore From Saved State

Turns on the virtual machine and restores it to the state it was in when its state was saved.

Discard Saved State

Discards the .vsv file that contains state information for this virtual machine, and leaves the virtual machine turned off.

Remove

Removes the virtual machine from Virtual Server, but does not delete the virtual machine's configuration file.