1VIRT-CLONE(1)            Virtual Machine Install Tools           VIRT-CLONE(1)
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NAME

6       virt-clone - clone existing virtual machine images
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SYNOPSIS

9       virt-clone [OPTION]...
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DESCRIPTION

12       virt-clone is a command line tool for cloning existing virtual machine
13       images using the "libvirt" hypervisor management library. It will copy
14       the disk images of any existing virtual machine, and define a new guest
15       with an identical virtual hardware configuration. Elements which
16       require uniqueness will be updated to avoid a clash between old and new
17       guests.
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19       By default, virt-clone will show an error if the necessary information
20       to clone the guest is not provided. The --auto-clone option will
21       generate all needed input, aside from the source guest to clone. An
22       interactive mode is available with the --prompt option, but this will
23       only ask for the minimum required options.
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OPTIONS

26       Most options are not required. Minimum requirements are --original or
27       --original-xml (to specify the guest to clone), --name, and appropriate
28       storage options via -file.
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30       -h, --help
31           Show the help message and exit
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33       --connect=CONNECT
34           Connect to a non-default hypervisor. See virt-install(1) for
35           details
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37   General Options
38       General configuration parameters that apply to all guest clones.
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40       -o ORIGINAL_GUEST, --original=ORIGINAL_GUEST
41         Name of the original guest to be cloned. This guest must be shut off
42         or paused since it is not possible to safely clone active guests at
43         this time.
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45       --original-xml=ORIGINAL_XML
46         Libvirt guest xml file to use as the original guest. The guest does
47         not need to be defined on the libvirt connection. This takes the
48         place of the "--original" parameter.
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50       --auto-clone
51         Generate a new guest name, and paths for new storage.
52
53         An example or possible generated output:
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55           Original name        : MyVM
56           Generated clone name : MyVM-clone
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58           Original disk path   : /home/user/foobar.img
59           Generated disk path  : /home/user/foobar-clone.img
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61         If generated names collide with existing VMs or storage, a number is
62         appended, such as foobar-clone-1.img, or MyVM-clone-3.
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64       -n NAME, --name=NAME
65         Name of the new guest virtual machine instance. This must be unique
66         amongst all guests known to the hypervisor connection, including
67         those not currently active.
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69       -u UUID, --uuid=UUID
70         UUID for the guest; if none is given a random UUID will be generated.
71         If you specify UUID, you should use a 32-digit hexadecimal number.
72         UUID are intended to be unique across the entire data center, and
73         indeed world. Bear this in mind if manually specifying a UUID
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75   Storage Configuration
76       -f DISKFILE, --file=DISKFILE
77         Path to the file, disk partition, or logical volume to use as the
78         backing store for the new guest's virtual disk. If the original guest
79         has multiple disks, this parameter must be repeated multiple times,
80         once per disk in the original virtual machine.
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82       --force-copy=TARGET
83         Force cloning the passed disk target ('hdc', 'sda', etc.). By
84         default, "virt-clone" will skip certain disks, such as those marked
85         'readonly' or 'shareable'.
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87       --nonsparse
88         Fully allocate the new storage if the path being cloned is a sparse
89         file.  See virt-install(1) for more details on sparse vs. nonsparse.
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91       --preserve-data
92         No storage is cloned: disk images specific by --file are preserved as
93         is, and referenced in the new clone XML. This is useful if you want
94         to clone a VM XML template, but not the storage contents.
95
96   Networking Configuration
97       -m MAC, --mac=MAC
98         Fixed MAC address for the guest; If this parameter is omitted, or the
99         value "RANDOM" is specified a suitable address will be randomly
100         generated. Addresses are applied sequentially to the networks as they
101         are listed in the original guest XML.
102
103   Miscellaneous Options
104       --print-xml
105         Print the generated clone XML and exit without cloning.
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107       --replace
108         Shutdown and remove any existing guest with the passed "--name"
109         before cloning the original guest.
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111       -d, --debug
112         Print debugging information to the terminal when running the install
113         process.  The debugging information is also stored in
114         "$HOME/.virtinst/virt-clone.log" even if this parameter is omitted.
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116       --force
117         Prevent interactive prompts. If the intended prompt was a yes/no
118         prompt, always say yes. For any other prompts, the application will
119         exit.
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121       --prompt
122         Specifically enable prompting for required information. Default
123         prompting is off.
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EXAMPLES

126       Clone the guest called "demo" on the default connection, auto
127       generating a new name and disk clone path.
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129         # virt-clone \
130              --original demo \
131              --auto-clone
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133       Clone the guest called "demo" which has a single disk to copy
134
135         # virt-clone \
136              --original demo \
137              --name newdemo \
138              --file /var/lib/xen/images/newdemo.img
139
140       Clone a QEMU guest with multiple disks
141
142         # virt-clone \
143              --connect qemu:///system \
144              --original demo \
145              --name newdemo \
146              --file /var/lib/xen/images/newdemo.img \
147              --file /var/lib/xen/images/newdata.img
148
149       Clone a guest to a physical device which is at least as big as the
150       original guests disks. If the destination device is bigger, the new
151       guest can do a filesystem resize when it boots.
152
153         # virt-clone \
154              --connect qemu:///system \
155              --name demo \
156              --file /dev/HostVG/DemoVM \
157              --mac 52:54:00:34:11:54
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AUTHOR

160       Written by Kazuki Mizushima, and a team of many other contributors. See
161       the AUTHORS file in the source distribution for the complete list of
162       credits.
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BUGS

165       Please see http://virt-manager.org/page/BugReporting
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168       Copyright (C) Fujitsu Limited 2007, and various contributors.  This is
169       free software. You may redistribute copies of it under the terms of the
170       GNU General Public License "http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html".
171       There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.
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SEE ALSO

174       virsh(1), "virt-install(1)", "virt-manager(1)", the project website
175       "http://virt-manager.org"
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179                                  2011-07-13                     VIRT-CLONE(1)
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