Cloning Process for Virtual Machine in Oracle VirtualBox
- Once you have a virtual machine up and running you may find it handy to have a copy of that machine for testing purposes. This tool comes in handy when testing in a production environment, and you need to see how an update or patch will affect an existing machine before applying. Having two machines can be useful for network testing purposes as well.
This Wiki page will proceed under the assumption that you already have a virtual machine/machines created and configured in Oracle VirtualBox, so your existing machines should pop up in the left column of the window. Highlight the machine you wish to clone, then navigate to the top of the page where you should see some controls for your VM's(virtual machines), hit the button with the picture of the sheep on it that says “Clone”.
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Hitting the clone button should open this window, it is here that you will name your new machine. For all of the other settings, leave them set to the default as shown in the picture below, unless otherwise instructed in your assignment or by a teacher. Unless you are making an exact copy where the partitions are named the same or you are doing some advanced network configuring, verify that the defaults are the same as shown in the image below.
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Hitting next in this window should bring you to the page shown below. In this window it should be asking you if you want to make a full or a linked clone. It explains the difference between the two in the window, and for the most part, you will want to choose the “Full Clone” option which is what I will be doing here. Once you make your choice, hit “Clone”.
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Hitting “Clone” should bring up a small progress bar.
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Once this bar is finished you should see your newly cloned VM on the left panel of the main window of Oracle VirtualBox.
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