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Bakhtiyor
Asked: 2011-05-14 03:58:58 +0800 CST

How to safely shutdown Guest OS in VirtualBox using command line

  • 772

I have Ubuntu 10.10 and using VirtualBox 3.2. As a Guest OS I have another Ubuntu in the VirtualBox.

I am starting Guest Ubuntu automatically using following command once my Host Ubuntu boots:

VBoxHeadless -startvm Ubuntu --vrdp on

Then I can access to it with ssh or tsclient.

Now I need to shutdown automatically Guest Ubuntu once I shutdown my Host Ubuntu. Does anybody know any safe method to automatically shutdown Guest Ubuntu with a command line? I have found out two ways one can shutdown Guest OS but I am not sure whether they are safe or not. Here are they:

VBoxManage controlvm Ubuntu acpipowerbutton

or 

VBoxManage controlvm Ubuntu poweroff
virtualbox

7 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    If you open up Gnome Power management preferences, you can set what actions to take when the power button. If you set it to shut down, it will shut down gracefully when you press the virtual power button with the VBoxManage controlvm Ubuntu acpipowerbutton command.

    • 70

  2. To safe shutdown vm use this command:

    vboxmanage controlvm Ubuntu acpipowerbutton
    • 26

  3. Don't do this:

    VBoxManage controlvm Ubuntu poweroff

    It is equivalent to pulling the power plug on a real computer. You don't want to do this!

    Use the ACPI shutdown method (check the power management setting like Egil suggests) or maybe give the save state method (savestate) a try.

    • 14

  4. If you are shutting down the vm when the server does, yo have to wait for the vm(s)

    (In this shellscript 'root' is the invoker, and 'theuser' is the owner of 'thevm')

    I know the vms have finished when the output of the command VBoxManage list runningvms returns an empty string.

    I use this in my shell script

    ...
stop(){
    su -c "VBoxManage controlvm thevm acpipowerbutton" -s /bin/bash theuser
    while [ "`su -c 'VBoxManage list runningvms' -s /bin/bash theuser`" != "" ]
    do
        echo waiting for VMs to shutdown
        sleep 3
    done
}
...
    • 12

  5. You should poweroff your virtual Ubuntu just like you do poweroff your real hardware. From a commanline on a ssh session remotely issue:

    sudo poweroff

    If you want to save the machine state (similar to suspend/hibernate) use the second point in @htorque's answer.

    • 7

  6. One problem with shutting down a vm with the savestate option is if you have to move that vm to another computer. You may run into a problem if the new computer uses a different processor and perhaps other differences in hardware. When a vm restarts from a saved state, it needs its environment back, which won't happen if the processor is different. A vm that has been properly shut-down, looks at the current hardware when it is restarted and normally will bring in some or all of the new drivers it needs.

    • 1

  7. I usually shutdown the VM (Linux) by $ sudo shutdown -h now I guess it is the most gracefull way of terminating the VM because it is shutdown (not poweroff) and provides grace time and (possiblly) the message to the login users.

    • -4