File Management
flex.plane lets you browse, read, and write files directly on a running VM through the QEMU guest agent. This is useful for quick configuration changes, log inspection, or deploying small files without needing SSH access.
Check prerequisites
File management requires the QEMU guest agent to be running inside the VM. You can verify this on the VM's detail page — the agent status shows whether it is active.
If the agent is not available, you will need to access the VM via SSH or the VNC console instead.
sudo apt install qemu-guest-agent
sudo systemctl enable --now qemu-guest-agent
Browse files
Navigate to the VM's detail page and open the Files tab. The file browser shows the contents of the current directory.
The Files tab provides a file browser with file names, types, sizes, permissions, ownership, and modification timestamps.
Each entry shows:
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
name | File or directory name |
type | FILE, DIRECTORY, or SYMLINK |
size | Size in bytes |
permissions | Unix permission string (e.g. rwxr-xr-x) |
owner | File owner |
modified | Last modification timestamp |
Navigate into subdirectories by clicking on them. The listing is non-recursive — it only shows the direct contents of the current directory.
Read file content
Click on a file to view its contents. This works well for text files like configuration files, logs, and scripts.
Write files
You can write content to a file on the VM through the file browser. If the file already exists, it is overwritten. If it does not exist, it is created.