Daniel, Thanks for your prompt response. I have another question, as soon as I do virsh save <GuestID> <filename>, the corresponding xml and pid under /var/run/libvirt/qemu is gone, but the guest still has a definition. At this point, if I query the domain state (i.e. virsh domstate --reason <GUESTID>) it reads shutoff(saved). Where does this fetch the reason from, when the /var/run/libvirt/qemu/Guestname.xml file is gone? Libvirtd maintains the reason code in-memory?