Running applications withing a VM from a host command-line

[oloth]

In short, can I run an application from within a guest, just by specifying command line parameters to a vmanage from the host?

My clients send me a lot of untrusted applications that's why I use a persistent VM to run those, and that makes a it a lot of clicking within the VM.
Is there a possibility to execute applications inside the VM by running a shell script from the HOST?

Thank you in advance.

[stefan.becker]

VBoxManage guestcontrol execute Guest Command

For the exact syntax read User Manual.

[oloth]

thanks a lot
I appreciate it

[HubTou]

Hello,

VBoxManage guestcontrol execute Guest Command

It's also possible to do it with "VBoxManage controlvm <uuid>|<name> keyboardputscancode <hex> [<hex> ...]".

On the minus side:
- You don't get any feedback on the command output (unless you redirect it somewhere (for example with output redirection, "tee" or "script" on Unix guests) and use other commands to analyse it)

On the plus side:
- It works without Guest Additions (GA)
- It always work, even when you're installing the OS inside the guest (too early to have GA inside)
- It's not limited to actions on commands (for example, you can send events to GUI apps)

You'll find a small shell library to ease the use of scancodes and a whole example in which an host controls the installation and configuration of an OS in a Guest there:
http://www.projet-hev.org/dist/generateur1.tar.bz2

Best regards,

Hubert

[oloth]

Thank you for the additional info,
that's really works for me,
Thanks

[HubTou]

Hello,

Here's a little video capture of my generator running in debug mode plus VNC display (both are not needed):
http://www.projet-hev.org/dist/hev1.flv

The OS is installed twice (the first time in a small 1GB swap-less rescue partition, the second time in the main partition) and with very little configuration (because there's a second generator which takes care of that). The disk geometry and the partitions sizes are input parameters...

Best regards,

Hubert