[Solved] Help Requested with Registering VMs

[robertb1]

Hi,

I am running VBox 5.2.16 on a Linux host (Ubuntu 16.04). I created several VMs last year (mail server, cloud server, Windows 7, blah blah) using the GUI and everything has been working well, but I find myself with a problem. I moved my VMs onto a RAID1 array for data safety and I also want to periodically back them up on a NAS. So I find myself needing, probably weekly, to shut down the VMs, copy them to the NAS, and then restart them (automated really late at night).

This is where I have my problem. On my host's Linux command line, vboxmanage list runningvms returns nothing. So I've now learned that my VMs need to be registered in order to do anything with them via command line. I've not been successful registering them using the command line and I've been unable to find online any way of registering them through a graphic interface.

I would love any kind of help to register my VMs through whichever method. My VMs are located at /mnt/raid/LiveVMs/<VM name>

Appreciate any and all help! Thanks

[BillG]

I don't follow what your problem is. Why do the vms need to be registered? How do the come to be not registered? Simply shutting them down and copying them should not cause that. I could understand that you would need to register them if you tried to run them from the backed up copies.

You do not even need the GUI to register a vm. Simply run its VBOX file from wherever the vm is stored.

[robertb1]

Bill,

Here is what I get when I try to start my .vbox from the command line:

root@VirtualMachine:/mnt/raid/LiveVMs/03 - Share# vboxmanage startvm "03 - Share.vbox"
VBoxManage: error: Could not find a registered machine named '03 - Share.vbox'
VBoxManage: error: Details: code VBOX_E_OBJECT_NOT_FOUND (0x80bb0001), component VirtualBoxWrap, interface IVirtualBox, callee nsISupports
VBoxManage: error: Context: "FindMachine(Bstr(pszVM).raw(), machine.asOutParam())" at line 595 of file VBoxManageMisc.cpp

So I feel like I'm in an infinite loop of "I can't run it until it's registered, but I can't register it until I run it..." What am I doing wrong here?

Thanks

[socratis]

The VMs are registered on a per-user basis, the user that created the VM. I see that you run the command as 'root'. Did you create the VMs as 'root'? If you did BTW, that's not a great idea to run VirtualBox (or anything non-essential) as 'root'.

[robertb1]

Genius genius genius! Thank you, that was my problem! No, I was just working in root, my vms are under my user. I just had to exit out of root to my user and everything worked. I don't know if I can mark this as "Solved" but I'll try after posting this.

I do have one last question though. I started all my vms from command line, but the GUI doesn't reflect that they're running, all show "Powered Off". Is this just the nature of VBox, or should the GUI still show status as "Running"? I see through this activity there is a disconnect between the command line and the GUI with VBox. Do I just need to manage VBox 100% from command line now?

Thanks again!

[socratis]

I started all my vms from command line, but the GUI doesn't reflect that they're running, all show "Powered Off".

How? I just tried it and it worked as intended. For example I started my VM with:

• 
  VBoxManage startvm FreeDOS

from the command line and it showed as Running in the Manager. But if you have more questions regarding that, better start a new thread.

I don't know if I can mark this as "Solved" but I'll try after posting this.

Don't worry, I'll mark it for you.