Vmware is a virtual computing system that gives you the best of all worlds. In the course of my average work/school day, I often have to develop applications, run tests and test tools on multiple platforms, Linux, FreeBSD, windows. In the past I used to either dual boot, run cygwin or rely on multiple machines. These seem adequate until I discovered vmware.
Installing vmware ware is easy enough.
On my machine, I run a windows xp professional as my guest, I installed a FreeBSD guest to simulate my installed system at work and thus test new changes safely before carrying them out on my live server.
My FreeBSD host runs has 256 MB RAM, uses NAT for Network Access and I run kdesktop as my xwindow application. I also installed evolution for my email applications (I was running Linux on my previous laptop and all my tools and applications were linux based, and I haven't found a way to export my mail from evolution yet), kdevelop for my software development, NS2 for my network simulation, gnupg for mail and file encryption and email signature, OLAMP (open-source Linux/FreeBSD Apache Mysql and Perl/PHP) for my webdevelopement projects. Courier mail server to simulate my live mail-server, kerberos to simulate my live authentication system, tripwire, snort to simulate my IDS, sniff, and many other linux based tools. And I am able to use all these tools, modify them with no compromise or need to port them to windows. I run samba to seamless share folders (vmware also has a shared folder resource) and since most my development experience is with kdevelop, emacs, gcc and perl, I just get the best of all world and when I need to develop on windows, I use visual studio.net(visual C++), visual perl. Usualy as a proof of concept or for testing/debuging applications to be ported to windows.
MyVMware installation has a short coming with the screen size when running xwindow and its quit frustrating when I have to run an x application like ethereal, kdevelop, nessus or even evolution, so I installed tightvnc on FreeBSD and now I just connect to my xwindow running tightvnc server on FreeBSD and tightvnc viewer on windows! I get a bigger screen and am more productive.
When I have to run ssh to other boxes or to work on console applications, I use putty (a window ssh client) to connect and again get the benefit of my 17 inch LCD display!
My PhD thesis (research) requires that I build a portable OS, an I have installed a Linux guest to test the concept and research the Linux kernel to simulate a compact OS for secure voting architecture.
I had a lot of problem installing NS 2 for Linux, but the installation for FreeBSD is a breez.
The cool thing is I can run all operating systems simoultenously on the same computer. My only worries are Harddisk space ( I currently have 60GB) and RAM space (I currently have 768 MB and plan to increase my RAM to 2GB and maybe increase my Harddisk to 120GB for good measure, but for now, I am cool and enjoying the benefits of vmware
1 comment:
I installed vmware workstation 5 in place of the workstation 4 on my laptop. Seems better? Or is it because I'm running Fedora Core 3 in place of FreeBSD 5? maybe.
Well, I'll try to get a perpetual license for this installation and run many of my testbed in this environment.
In the coming months, I'll also try to implement a GSX based honeynet as a proof of conccept.
In general, I view vmware as a valuable resource and do recomend it highly.
Post a Comment