How can I show the console of a headless running vbox vm

command linevirtualbox

I have a virtualbox headless VM running on CentOS 7. I can show the console of the VM by opening up the virtualbox manager, right clicking the machine and choose "Show". Is there a way to do this (pop up the head of the headless client) without opening up the gui manager, i.e., from the command line? I've tried most likely commands for vboxmanage but get errors or the wrong result.

Best Answer

So far, no answers. After more research it looks like VirtualBox does not provide this functionality. Best that it seems I can do is to use a remote desktop. For my CentOS, the most convenient app is rdesktop. You need to have the extension pack installed. Then enable remote desktop protocol for the client. Once the VM is running you can then use rdesktop to access the client console. If rdesktop is started immediately after the VM, you do get access to the boot sequence. Thus: 

$ vboxmanage modifyvm "archive" --vrde on
$ vboxmanage startvm "archive" --type headless ; rdesktop localhost
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