HV_VSS_DAEMON(8)

📦 version 15.1, in freebsd 14.5, freebsd 15.1

💅 hv_vss_daemon (8) — Hyper-V Volume Shadow Copy Service Daemon

ok so first things first, bestie: this is from the System Manager's Manual, and the page is literally called hv_vss_daemon(8). say it with me — Hyper-V Volume Shadow Copy Service Daemon. iconic name, honestly.

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

hv_vss_daemon [-dn]

that's it. two flags. we love a low-maintenance queen 👑

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

okay so picture this: you're running a FreeBSD guest partition on Hyper-V, and the daemon hv_vss_daemon is out here giving you the ability to freeze and thaw the file system. yes, freeze and thaw. like a glow-up but for filesystems, no cap 💖

Hyper-V lets administrators backup or restore the FreeBSD guest partition. and how do they do it? with Windows Powershell scripts, bestie. that's the tool. that's the whole vibe.

so hv_vss_daemon is the middle man with main character energy — it accepts file system freeze and thaw requests from the hv_utils(4) driver and then performs the actual file-system operation. it doesn't just talk about it, it does it. periodt.

now why does this matter? the file system freeze and thaw functionality is useful when the Hyper-V host wants to do live backup of FreeBSD guest. here's the choreography 💃:

  • Hyper-V host sends a file system freezing request to hv_vss_daemon, and the daemon conducts the real operation.
  • after successfully freezing the file system, the Hyper-V host takes a snapshot of the VM.
  • and then, in the future, the Hyper-V host can restore the FreeBSD VM through that snapshot. 🎀

it's giving teamwork. it's giving trust the process.

the options are as follows:

🌸 OPTIONS 🌸

  • -d — runs as a regular process instead of a daemon, for debugging purpose. lowkey the "let me watch what's happening" mode 🫶
  • -n — generate debugging output. more output, more info, more everything. iykyk 🙈

👑 SEE ALSO 👑

hv_vmbus(4), hv_utils(4), hv_netvsc(4), hv_storvsc(4), hv_kvp(4)

go read the whole family, they're all slay 💅

⭐ HISTORY ⭐

the daemon was introduced in October 2016 and developed by Microsoft Corp. a moment in time, fr fr 🔥

💜 AUTHORS 💜

FreeBSD support for hv_vss_daemon was first added by Microsoft BSD Integration Services Team <bsdic@microsoft.com>. giving credit where credit is due, as we should 🎀

and that's the whole page bestie — this one came from Debian, dated October 12, 2016. date night with a manpage, we ate 🌈✨

📦 where this page comes from