so maybe i'm kinda dumb... if we deploy VMs using cloud-init images... do they not persist state changes to the system disk? should I have done installs to the system disk from ISO images? and if folks confirm my dumbness, is there a way to snapshot current vms so when I reboot them later I get them back as is even if they are stateless cloud-init things?

They persist. Why do you ask?

well. i think i had a power failure or some restart and it seemed to revert back to a freshly deployed state. I could be mis-remembering. still, out of an abundance of caution.... quick URL pointer to snapshotting with harvester for dummies anywhere?

The cloud-init image has a layer over it for the VM to persist disk changes. It does however need to retain that backing image for the layer to function properly. You can "flatten" the image to remove that dependency but it doesn't happen automagically. You need to back up your backing image (the cloud image) as well as the longhorn disk image/snapshot.

grrr. layers of confusion. i don't have backup storage configured at the moment. maybe i'll test persistance with a fresh deploy and see if all this worry is necessary

For sure it persists.

thank you