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There are two ways to start a guest: with the "Start" command and the "Start once" command. The difference is that with the "Start" command, if the virtual machine is stopped for any reason outside of other than a user action from the Dashboard, the flexVDI Manager will start it again. This option is specially useful for server type machines. For now, simply right click on the Guest's "Start/Stop" dropdown and click on "Start once".
You have just asked flexVDI Manager to start a Guest. This operation takes may take several seconds to complete, but you didn't have to wait that time to go on managing your infrastructure. flexVDI Dashboard does not make you wait until the operations you request complete; instead. Instead, you can immediately continue using the program because all communication communications between flexVDI Dashboard and flexVDI Manager is are asynchronous. As a result, sometimes the information you see on your screen is not completely up to date, as it can take some seconds moments to be refreshed. If you want to see the up to date state of your systems you can click on the "Refresh" button (the green arrow in the right top corner of the Data Center tree) to refresh all the information about your infrastructure.
Connecting to the Guest
Now you will want to access the console of your new Guest. When a Guest is started, the "Open Console" option button is enabled in its context menu. You can click on it, and a new window browser tab will open.
Congratulations! You have successfully created your Guest, and you have opened its system console. You can proceed with the Operating System installation now. Check the chapter on how to Improve performance of Windows guests for specific notes about this operating system configure guest operating systems.
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"Open console" needs to open a network connection to a port > 5899 (like 5900, 5901, 5902, ...) of one of the flexVDI Hosts (the one that is running this virtual machine).If the guest console window is not opened in a few seconds, check that there is network connectivity from your local machine to those ports in the physical hostopens a new broswer tab. When you do this for the first time, your browser will probably prevent it and warn you with a message. Follow its instructions to allow the flexVDI Dashboard to open new tabs. |
The guest tools
flexVDI offers the flexVDI Guest Tools. This software significantly improves the user experience providing features and improved performance. When you complete the installation of the O.S, with your machine still running, you can right click on the Guest in flexVDI Dashboard, and then click on the "Insert Tools" command. A dialog will offer you to select a virtual optical drive where to insert the guest tools ISO image; if the drive is in use by another image, they will be swapped. This will insert a virtual optical disk in the machine that will start the installation of the softwareIt includes two types of software components:
- Virtio drivers for Windows. Most Linux distributions come with support for virtio devices, but Windows does not. Drivers for all virtio devices are included in the Guest Tools ISO. In particular, you will need this ISO inserted during Windows installation if your disk images use this controller type, so that the drivers can be loaded. Look inside the "viostor" folder for the right driver for your Windows edition.
- Guest agents. These are agents running inside the Guest and communicate with the flexVDI Client, enabling features like clipboard sharing, resolution adjustment and automatic session login.
Insert the Guest Tools ISO in a running Guest just changing the ISO file in one of the configured optical drives. It includes an installer for Linux and Windows, that will install and activate the Guest Agents and the required drivers for any detected virtio device in your Guest.
The Guest Tools ISO is installed in every host, and can be updated with yum just like any other system package. Alternatively, you can download the latest version of the software from http://depot.flexvdi.com/guest-tools/The flexVDI Guest Tools for Windows include device drivers for several paravirtualized devices. In particular, they are needed for the virtio network interface and the virtio disk controller. If you want to install Windows directly on a virtio disk, you will have to insert the guest tools during the installation and load the viostor driver, in order to detect the hard drive and continue with the installation process.