[vbox-dev] How to start a VM from Python/COM ?

[Nikolay Igotti]

    Hi,

  First of all, it would be nice if you tried vboxshell.py first. It's 
strongly recommended
to use uniform bindings (vboxapi.py) in all newly developed code.
  With it code is pretty simple:

from vboxapi import VirtualBoxManager
mgr = VirtualBoxManager(None, None)
vbox = mgr.vbox
name = "ubu"
mach = vbox.findMachine(name)
session = mgr.mgr.getSessionObject(vbox)
progress = mach.launchVMProcess(session, "gui", "")
progress.waitForCompletion(-1)

  Your issue with OS name is a Python bug 
(http://bugs.python.org/issue1082), please upgrade Python
to more functional version.
  Generally, please make your posting more relevant and compact, last 7 
postings you did to vbox-dev
were too much for amount of real issues reported.

   Thanks,
     Nikolay

On 1/30/11 7:29 PM, Alexey Eromenko wrote:
> Hi all !
>
> Today I tried to write small python script to start VirtualBox VMs. It
> should work from both Windows and Linux hosts.
>
> Host: Windows Vista 32 + VBox 4.0 + SDK + python 2.5 + pywin32
>
> TRY 1:
> I wrote according to VBox SDK docs (2.3.1 Python COM API, v4.0
> SDKref.PDF): (plus added few imports)
> ======================================================
>
> import os,sys
> import win32com
>
> vbox = win32com.client.Dispatch("VirtualBox.VirtualBox")
> session = win32com.client.Dispatch("VirtualBox.Session")
> mach = vbox.findMachine("uuid or name of machine to start")
> progress = mach.launchVMProcess(session, "gui", "")
> progress.waitForCompletion(-1)
>
> EOF
>
> I get this:
>
> E:\Alex-temp>vbox-devel01.py
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>    File "E:\Alex-temp\vbox-devel01.py", line 16, in<module>
>      vbox = win32com.client.Dispatch("VirtualBox.VirtualBox")
> AttributeError: 'module' object has no attribute 'client'
>
> ----
> I tried to read source of "vboxshell.py", but it is too hard for me,
> and it does not use "VirtualBox.VirtualBox" unlike the SDK example.
> I have basic skills in python, but not in VirtualBox-python and not in
> COM programming.
> Any ideas ?
>
> TRY 2:
> This code I copied from "2.3.2 Common Python bindings layer" SDK PDF.
> ======================================================
>
> # This code assumes vboxapi.py from VirtualBox distribution
> # being in PYTHONPATH, or installed system-wide
> from vboxapi import VirtualBoxManager
> # This code initializes VirtualBox manager with default style
> # and parameters
> virtualBoxManager = VirtualBoxManager(None, None)
> # Alternatively, one can be more verbose, and initialize
> # glue with webservice backend, and provide authentication
> # information
> virtualBoxManager = VirtualBoxManager("WEBSERVICE",
> {’url’:’http://myhost.com::18083/’,
> ’user’:’me’,
> ’password’:’secret’})
>
> And here is the error:
> E:\Alex-temp>vbox-devel02.py
>    File "E:\Alex-temp\vbox-devel02.py", line 13
> SyntaxError: Non-ASCII character '\x92' in file E:\Alex-temp\vbox-devel02.py on
> line 13, but no encoding declared; see http://www.python.org/peps/pep-0263.html
> for details
>
> I tried to add:
> # -*- coding: ascii -*-
> ..on the first line, but it did not help.
> Any ideas ?
>
> TRY 3:
> ======================================================
> vboxshell.py renders text incorrectly on my Windows host.
>
> I did one command: "help", and got:
>
> vbox>  help
> Help page:
>      ←[94malias←[0m: Control aliases
>      ←[94mattachCtr←[0m: Attach storage controller to the VM: attachCtr win Ctr0
> IDE ICH6
>      ←[94mattachHdd←[0m: Attach HDD to the VM: attachHdd win /disk.vdi "IDE Contr
> oller" 0:1
>      ←[94mattachIso←[0m: Attach CD/DVD to the VM: attachIso win /os.iso "IDE Cont
> roller" 0:1
>      ←[94mattachUsb←[0m: Attach USB device to the VM (use listUsb to show availab
> le devices): attachUsb win uuid
>      ←[94mcloseportal←[0m: Close teleportation portal (see openportal,teleport):
> closeportal Win
> ...
>
> vboxshell.py, being a 100K byte code example is too hard to understand.
> Why are those extra characters rendered ? Because Windows 'cmd'
> console does not support colors ?
> ======================================================
> By and large I would like to see some *working*, yet
> easy-to-understand examples.
>
> On the side note: SDKref.pdf references VBox 3.3 once, which should be
> changed to v4.0 (in chapter "3.4 VirtualBox events")
>