WATER & OIL (Linux & Windows)

OK, so here we have two instances of Linux Virtual Appliances running on top of Windows XP. One is StartCom's version of RHEL 5 and the other is Debian 'Etch'. The hardware is: AMD AthlonX2@2GHZ along with 2GB of RAM. What would make an ideal hardware set-up for virtualization? More cores? Yes! More RAM? Yes! Yes! More processors, cores and RAM? Installing and setting-up VMWARE Player on the WindowsXP platform is fairly simple and straight forward. Then you just have an overwhelming number of appliances to choose from. It will keep you intrigued for days... or maybe that is just me.

Project OIL&WATER (Linux & Windows)

So this weekend I set out to try virtualization software on Linux. My hardware: AMD AthlonXP running at 1.5Ghz and 512MB RAM. This is not an ideal platform to run virtualization tools on. I figured I'd try it out anyways. The software choices: Ubuntu 7.04 and Qemu (open source processor emulator).

I used the Ubuntu Community Docs as a guide for how to install WindowsXP under Ubuntu 7.04. Installation and configuration of Qemu wasn't too bad. Everything seemed to install just fine. Except I was restricted to only using about 128MB of RAM. I initially tried to use 256MB (half of the 512MB)... but I received some errors and had to reduce the value to 128MB. 128MB worked fine.. except the install of Windows was painfully slow.

When all was complete and the virtual machine rebooted itself into Windows this is what I was looking at:


Then I tried to login in:




"A problem is preventing Windows from accurately checking the license of this computer" is the error I receive. After some more research.. there is a work around by installing SP2. This particular flavor of WinXP didn't have SP2 installed. I have another, more up-to-date, copy of WinXP. I'll just try that instead.

I've tried the reverse of running a virtual Linux machine on a Windows platform. The hardware I had for that project was more robust that this setup (AMD AhtlonX2 running at 2GHZ, with 2GB of RAM). The software was WinXP Pro, VMWare Player and a Debian VMWare Virtual Appliance. Ran beautifully and really opened up options for maximizing the use of hardware.

Office Ubuntuized

This office is on the right track. Now they just need to upgrade their hardware.

Always Connected. Not Quite.

You know I am all about web-based applications but the single most frustrating factor is what happens when I don’t have Internet access? Your laptop becomes as useful as a mobile phone without service. You spend $2200.00 dollars on a high speed laptop which becomes totally useless as soon as it doesn’t have Internet access. This frustration came about when I was working with Google’s calendar function. I saw how powerful their Gmail/Calendar/Document tools have become. How powerful are they if you can’t access them… totally useless. Even when Wi-Fi becomes as accessible as GSM/Cell service is… you will still have a large number of areas where you will be unable to ‘connect’. How many times have you been frustrated with your mobile because you cannot get service? This will carry over into the next generation of wireless networks. If you live and work in a major metropolitan area… then you may not experience the loss of network connectivity as much as people not living in those areas. These tools are great while your connected… but we’re not always connected.

Thunderbird Lightning

I have been a fan of Mozilla’s Thunderbird email client for some time. Even though I was a fan.. I contined to use Microsoft’s Outlook email client. The single biggest factor for my continued use of Outlook was that I relied heavily on its tightly integrated calendar. I knew about Mozilla’s Sundbird calendar and tried using it along with Thunderbird. I would have two applications open and running, which I didn’t like. I tried to do it in order to pry myself away from Outlook, but it just didn’t work. I figured there was a plugin out there for Thunderbird but never got around to looking for one until I read a write-up by Nathan Willis on Linux.com. He went and answered all my questions and provided links for obtaining the Thunderbird calendar plugin called Lightning.

I have Lightning set-up in Thunderbird and will continue to explore all the capabilities especially when you integrate it with Google’s web-based calendar function.

So freeing myself from Outlook is looking more and more promising. Now, if I can only get my employer to do the same.

-djr