[Tfug] virtual machines, was: Re: battery life, power management and windows vs linux

[Shawn Nock]

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t takahashi wrote:
> hmm, of all the many options, ignoring speed entirely, which ones are
> nicest in ways like these?
> 
> * minimal effort to get started with it to run a windows program?
> * "                                                      to run, say,
> ubuntu under debian?

It is my understanding that they are all pretty easy. KVM is supposed to
(may already be) in the mainline kernel. I don't regularly use a debian
derivative, but RedHat ans SuSE derivatives tend to make Xen
installation "one click" installs. VMWare (Workstation and Server) are
pretty straight forward (perl script).

> * open source?

VMWare != open-source. The others are. A previous post noted that you
wil have to have a full windows install to virtualize windows (so no
solution will be 'open source'. Xen can now virtualize Windows is you
have a new enough processor: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xen "...As of
Xen 3.0.2, the list of supported unmodified guests is limited to certain
versions of Windows (incl. XP) and Linux."

> * safe -- unlikely to have cross-machine malware or bugs?

None that I know of on any of the above mentioned products.

> * allow cut/paste, pipe/socket, or disk transfer among machines?

VMWare, the others will rely on mounting a disk image or using some
network solution. This really is no big deal. You could create an image
copy files to it attach it to the vm and rescan the scsi bus (not as
hard as it sounds) or run nfs / cifs / scp.

> * have most flexibility e.g. re working with devices properly?

Hmm... not sure what you're asking here. Presumably usb /  other
pass-through devices supported by the hypervisor? I don't regularly use
these, so I'll be no help on this one.

Cheers,
Shawn


- --
Shawn Nock (OpenPGP: 0xB64200E1)
Unix Systems Group; CCIT
University of Arizona
nock at email.arizona.edu
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