Clone an instance

Launch a new instance with the same image, plan, storage, and access settings as an existing one, and save yourself choosing each setting again. Clone an instance to run more of the same setup in parallel, to give a new task or a teammate a setup that already works, or to try a change on a copy before you make it on the original. The clone is a separate instance in the same project, and the source instance is left unchanged.

Before you begin

• An instance to clone, in any status.
• Permission to create instances in the project. Every project role except MEMBER has it; a MEMBER needs a policy that allows creating instances.
• On a prepaid account, enough credit to launch the clone: about 24 hours of an On-Demand plan, or the full price of a committed term.

The clone is a new instance, billed on its own from when it reaches Running. For prices, see E2E’s pricing page.

What the clone copies

Copied from the source	Starts fresh on the clone
Image and version, or its custom image and registry namespace	The name: clone-instance- followed by the date and time, which you can change
Plan, including the Spot setting	The workspace: the same size, but empty
Workspace size and the Workspace Encryption setting	The reserved IP, which is off
SSH access and SSH keys	The security group, which you choose
Start scripts and add-ons	Packages you installed on the source
Mounted datasets, and mounted SFS and PFS with their mount paths
On a private cluster, its cluster, resources, and scheduling rules

Files in the source’s /home/jovyan stay on the source. To give the clone the packages installed on the source, save an image of the source first and pick that image in the clone form; see Save an instance as an image. To bring files across, copy them from the source’s workspace, or put shared data on an SFS that both instances mount. See Copy files to and from an instance and Mount datasets and file systems on an instance.

A disk dataset mounts on one instance at a time, so unmount it from the source first, or leave it off the clone. Otherwise the clone is refused with “This disk dataset is already mounted on other node.”

Clone the instance

1. Select Clone Instance in the source instance’s actions menu.
2. Review the form and change any field the same way as when you create an instance; see Create an instance for what each option does.
3. Under Network & Security, choose a security group; the clone starts with that field empty. When the form has SSH keys, as it does when the source has SSH access, choose a group that opens port 22, such as the project’s Default-SSH-Security-Group.
4. (Optional) Under Reserve IP Address, attach one of the project’s available reserved IPs to the clone. Each reserved IP has its own charge.
5. Select Clone Instance.

The clone is Waiting in Manage Instances until its container is ready, then turns Running.

To connect to the clone, see Connect to an instance over SSH. If the launch is refused or the clone stays on Waiting, see Troubleshooting TIR Instances.