gnt-instance startup INSTANCE_NAME
-While the command to stop one is::
+Note, that this will not work when an instance is in a permanently
+stopped state ``offline``. In this case, you will first have to
+put it back to online mode by running::
+
+ gnt-instance modify --online INSTANCE_NAME
+
+The command to stop the running instance is::
gnt-instance shutdown INSTANCE_NAME
+If you want to shut the instance down more permanently, so that it
+does not require dynamically allocated resources (memory and vcpus),
+after shutting down an instance, execute the following::
+
+ gnt-instance modify --ofline INSTANCE_NAME
+
.. warning:: Do not use the Xen or KVM commands directly to stop
instances. If you run for example ``xm shutdown`` or ``xm destroy``
on an instance Ganeti will automatically restart it (via