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Instances

An Instance is a KVM/libvirt virtual machine provisioned onto a resource group's compute nodes, storage, and networks. Every instance is deployed from an OS image (or a mountable ISO) and sized either from a predefined VM flavor or custom vCPU/memory/disk specs; from there it can be resized, migrated to a different processing unit, and managed through its own network interfaces, virtual disks, and attached PCI devices.

The same Create Instance flow can also provision a whole multi-node cluster instead of a single instance (Docker/Swarm-style deployments) — that path is out of scope for this section, which covers single-instance VM lifecycle only.

For specific tasks, see Create Instance, Network Interfaces, Resize Instance, and Migrate Instance under this section.

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Draft — needs screenshots. This section hasn't been through the docs-capture pipeline yet, so there are no screenshots. Steps are grounded in the current product code (routes and page components), not a live capture — verify against the running product once this section is captured.

The Instances index​

The Instances page lists every instance and cluster, grouping instances that belong to the same cluster underneath it. Columns cover name, UUID, image, cores, memory, boot disk, the two optional extra disks (each with a redundancy indicator), IP addresses (with a refresh action that pulls current IPs from external networks), and an Auto VM Restart toggle. From the page header you can also jump to Image Templates and Instance Flavours, or open Create Instance.

Instance details and tabs​

Opening an instance goes to its Overview tab, alongside its other detail tabs:

  • Overview — instance specs (cluster, vCPUs/memory, boot and extra disks, image, IPs, state, UUID, and a button to reveal login credentials), the resource group's assigned networks/datastores/compute nodes, a Virtual Disks summary, and live CPU, memory, bandwidth, and storage IOPS charts. The instance's lifecycle state is shown in human-readable form (e.g. Online, Offline, Building, Resizing, Has issues) rather than its raw status.
  • Interfaces — the instance's attached network interfaces; see Network Interfaces.
  • Virtual Disks — each vDisk's redundancy status and physical placement, with actions to sync a degraded disk, repair one, edit its redundancy, or delete an orphaned disk that's no longer in use.
  • PCI Devices — PCI devices attached to the instance.
  • Logs — a searchable table of the instance's lifecycle events (event name, transaction state, initiation time, and who started it).
  • Console — an embedded VNC console (Connect/Disconnect, and a Ctrl+Alt+Del control) for instances that are online.

Instance actions​

The action menu on an instance (from its row on the index, or its detail page header) exposes lifecycle actions, most gated to specific instance states:

  • Startup / Shutdown / Restart
  • Rename
  • Resize and Migrate — see their own pages
  • Attach new interface — only while stopped/shut off; see Network Interfaces
  • Attach/Detach CD-ROM
  • Attach/Detach PCI devices — only while shut off
  • Factory reset — only for instances with factory reset enabled
  • Manage user data — only for instances deployed from a cloud-init image
  • Destroy — permanently deletes the instance after a confirmation dialog; this is an inline action with no dedicated page.