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Lightsail is a container, more similar to docker than to a QEMU/Xen VPS with a rescue mode.
Stop and start it, usually it's hard to fuck it up to a point it won't boot after.
Create a snapshot as described here: https://lightsail.aws.amazon.com/ls/docs/en_us/articles/lightsail-how-to-create-a-snapshot-of-your-instance
Then create a new instance from this snapshot, all your files should be present but the container
will be created from scratch.
No, Lightsail instances are not containers. They are virtual machines. You can verify this by running
systemd-detect-virtand noting it returnsxen, as well as other observations like the fact it boots from an OS provided kernel and gives direct access to the disk block device.There is a separate container service available on Lightsail, but it works nothing like instances and the documentation you shared is for instances. Most likely the OP is referring to instances as well.
Yes, it's a mix of things based on Xen but not a complete emulated system from BIOS to CPU
and peripherals like bare Xen or EC2 would be. You don't have low level access to a bunch of
stuff that can make your image unbootable, such as GRUB, LVM etc.
Basically you can run a new instance from an old block storage disk, with minimal risks of
data loss compared to an unbootable EC2 instance which would require rescue mode.
I linked a shorter version of this:
https://lightsail.aws.amazon.com/ls/docs/en_us/articles/understanding-instance-snapshots-in-amazon-lightsail
I meant instances.
If there is no rescue mode, how can I transfer from a LightSail instance to another vendor, say, Hetzner?
You create a disk snapshot and convert it. Even with real virtualization like QEMU/Xen you can't
easily move it to Hetzner, unless you run your own hypervisor (Proxmox, etc) and can import an
image there in the .qcow2 / .raw format.
The easier solution will be just getting all the files and configs from there, aka normal backup.
Lightsail instances are not containers.
You do have low level access to everything you would want, including GRUB. This is because they are virtual machines. Just because you cannot access a serial console or the GRUB menu, does not make it a container or not a Virtual Machine.
Try this:
sudo rm -rf /boot/grubDespite the fact that the VM is listed as "Running", you will not be able to access it again. Because you just hosed its GRUB configuration.
You can also manipulate the GRUB config and it will take effect on the boot. Though as noted you cannot access a serial console or rescue mode, so this is a bad idea.
Moreover, you can issue
sudo dmesgand see the full logs of your VM booting up, including several mentions of emulated hardware devices. This would not ever happen on a container.AWS also refers to them as Virtual Machines in some writing: https://aws.amazon.com/getting-started/hands-on/launch-a-virtual-machine/
And a couple references (2 hits) on https://aws.amazon.com/lightsail/faq/
Note: All tests and fact finding done in research for this comment were done on a Debian Lightsail instance.
Further note: I have not yet tried restoring a snapshot of a prior VM to see if that boots as well. Feel free to try it after hosing GRUB and let me know what you find.
It can't even reinstall OS.