Can I have a guest OS open at start up?

[ptex]

I have one VirtualBox running on a laptop the host is XP pro and the guest os is also xp pro. I would like to have the guest os open at start up for a cretin user name, can this be done?

I have 13 laptops that children, and old people (who have discovered porn btw) have access to at our rec center, keeping these things running is almost a full time job.

[Perryg]

You can create a batch file using the VBoxManage startvm command and place a shortcut to the batch file in the startup folder.
See chapter 8. VBoxManage reference for the syntax

Or you can setup the laptops to boot to a Linux live CD and not have a problem with viruses or other problems.

[Sasquatch]

In case of Windows Hosts, using the VBoxManage command will leave a command prompt running. If you use the startvm parameter with the main VirtualBox.exe program, it will still start the VM, but not a command prompt that needs to keep running.

[ptex]

Thanks I'll check out Ch. 8.

So ch 8 won't help me?

[Sasquatch]

Chapter 8 will certainly help you. It contains all the information you need for the VBoxManage command utility. The program usually gives the prompt back after it's done, but when you start a VM with it on Windows, the prompt won't be returned until the VM is shut down. To avoid this, you can use VirtualBox.exe for it. When you run VirtualBox.exe without arguments, you will get the normal GUI with the list of VMs, option to change settings of the VM, start it, create a new VM, etc. The VirtualBox.exe program should not be used for other options that are in chapter 8, only the startvm parameter is useful.

[MarkCranness]

I have 13 laptops that children, and old people (who have discovered porn btw) have access to at our rec center, keeping these things running is almost a full time job.

You may want to consider Windows Steady State, in addition to, or instead of VirtualBox:
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/produc ... fault.mspx

If using Perryg's suggestion, on a Windows host, a command prompt won't be left running (at least not in VB 3.0.8), but a command prompt window will briefly popup while VB is starting the VM and then close.
If that is a problem, there are ways of hiding it (ask if you need to know how).
Edit: VirtualBox -startvm <VM Name> (=the solution Sasquatch was suggesting, and far better than the solution I had in mind. I tried VirtualBox startvm <VM Name> (no hyphen) which didn't work, leading me down a merry path.)