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VirtualBox 4.3 autostart on Debian wheezy

Nikola Stojanoski 11 Comments

Since VirtualBox 4.2 there is autostart script which helps you start your virtual machines during boot. Here is a howto for VirtualBox 4.3 autostart on Debian wheezy.

Before this autostart script the virtual machines ware started usually from rc.local, now you can do it with VirtualBox autostart config. Do the following to enable the autostart service:

As root:

vi /etc/default/virtualbox

add this lines:

VBOXAUTOSTART_DB=/etc/vbox
VBOXAUTOSTART_CONFIG=/etc/vbox/autostart.conf

Now change the permissions to the folder for vboxusers

chgrp vboxusers /etc/vbox
chmod 1775 /etc/vbox

Create the /etc/vbox/autostart.conf and add this users that you want autostart to be enabled, my users for running the virtual machines is vbox

vi /etc/vbox/autostart.conf
# Default policy is to deny starting a VM, the other option is "allow".
default_policy = deny
# user vbox is allowed to start virtual machines but starting them
# will be delayed for 10 seconds
vbox = {
 allow = true
 startup_delay = 10
}

Now login as vbox and enable autostart on the machines you want to start automatically, i will do  it for two machines called VirtualMachine1 and VirtualMachine2

VBoxManage setproperty autostartdbpath /etc/vbox
VBoxManage modifyvm VirtualMachine1 --autostart-enabled on
VBoxManage modifyvm VirtualMachine2 --autostart-enabled on

Now, as root run this command, or reboot your server:

/etc/init.d/vboxautostart-service start

Note: vboxautostart-service uses only start and stop

More:
Starting virtual machines during system boot

Nikola Stojanoski

System Administrator and Developer. Giving back to the community by blogging about my problems, solutions and practical howto's.

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  • Dan

    I’m not seeing the *.start or *.stop scripts getting created under /etc/vbox. Made sure permissions are set (and the vboxusers group is the group of /etc/vbox and the user is a member of vboxusers). Any ideas?

    Running ubuntu server 12.04-4 (64bit) and VirtualBox 4.3.8.

    • nstojanoski

      Just installed VirtualBox 4.3.8 on Debian 7 and enabled autostart using this tutorial. Check the tutorial once again maybe you have missed some of the steps.

    • S

      I don`t not why the files .stop and .start are not created but: I created manually the file “/etc/vbox/vbox.start” with the content “1” (without quotes), and “/etc/vbox/vbox.stop” with the same content (“1”). After many, many hours now I can start and stop the machine: “/etc/init.d/vboxautostart-service start” and “/etc/init.d/vboxautostart-service stop”… and is auto-started after reboot.

  • longxxxisland

    vbox user doesn’t exist

    • nstojanoski

      as the tutorial explains vbox is the user i run my virtual machines. you need to adjust it with the user you run your machines.

      • longxxxisland

        Thanks, got it working now.

  • longxxxisland

    VBoxManage: error: The machine is not mutable (state is Saved)
    VBoxManage: error: Details: code VBOX_E_INVALID_VM_STATE (0x80bb0002), component SessionMachine, interface IMachine, callee nsISupports
    VBoxManage: error: Context: “COMSETTER(AutostartEnabled)(ValueUnion.f)” at line 2616 of file VBoxManageModifyVM.cpp

    • nstojanoski

      your virtual machines need to be shut down not running or in saved state.

  • S

    Do you know what means this error? The .start file is not created
    Starting VirtualBox VMs configured for autostartls: cannot access /etc/vbox/*.start: No such file or directory
    thanks

  • Alright, VM will start on boot, but how I can shutdown the VM gracefully while shutting down my host?