In the vSphere Client, which action must be taken to create a copy of a running virtual machine?

Creating a copy of a running virtual machine in the vSphere Client involves utilizing the cloning feature specifically designed for this purpose. The correct action is to select the running virtual machine, right-click it, and then choose the option to clone it as a virtual machine. This option allows you to make an identical copy of the VM, preserving its current state and configuration, which is essential for both disaster recovery scenarios and scaling out resources.

Cloning a virtual machine is useful in development and testing environments where you might want to create multiple instances of an environment without disrupting the original. This directly applies to the selected action where cloning is performed on the running VM.

The other choices focus on template management rather than cloning a running VM. For instance, cloning to a template does not create a copy of the VM itself but rather serves to generate a template for subsequent deployments. Similarly, converting a VM template to a virtual machine or creating a new VM from a template does not pertain to cloning a currently active VM. Hence, the action involving cloning a running virtual machine directly addresses the requirement, making it the correct response.