Virtual machines

Organisation

A virtual machine is a PC platform implemented in software. As a BigV account holder you can create as many as you need. Virtual machines can have up to 8 discs connected and 8 network interfaces, and are connected to Bytemark's core network at gigabit speed. BigV's virtual machines are based on the "virtio" hardware interface which requires newer versions of Operating Systems - older ones are supported by a slower compatibility mode.

Virtual machines are organised into groups for network and administrative separation; all virtual machines belong to a group but if you just want lots of standalone machines you can ignore that. All groups belong to an account which is how we send out bills.

Peripherals

Virtual machines have a single CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive. You can insert a CD or remove it whenever you need.

Naming

Every virtual machine you create has a predictable name in the DNS. This lets you connect immediately and not have to remember the IP addresses of each one. The name is created from the following elements in order:

• the machine name, e.g. 'web1';
• the group name, e.g.' default' if you've not set one;
• the account name, e.g. 'snowbother'; and
• the cluster name, e.g. 'uk0.bigv.io'.

So e.g. the full name in DNS for that example would be web1.default.snowbother.uk0.bigv.io.

You can of course set up as many names as you want for a virtual machine, and the automatic name isn't published in a list anywhere. It's just for quickly finding the address of a new system, but can be used publically if it suits you.

Shorthand when dealing with multiple groups and accounts

If you deal with multiple groups and accounts, you can avoid specifying the --account and --group parameters for all commands by just adding them to the machine name, e.g. this:

bigv vm new --name new1 --group shop --account matthew

is equivalent to this shorthand:

bigv vm new new1.shop.matthew