Introduction In the Working with Virtual operating systems, we learned some basic stuff about VM ware workstation and its configuration. In this article we will discuss the installation of a Virtual operating system. Booting the operating system As we have discussed already we can boot via two ways, One is with the physical CD-ROM, and other with a Virtual drive. Mount the image with any virtual drive program for booting via virtual drive. And also remember to select the appropriate drive in the settings. In the above figure, k: is the virtual drive I am going to use it for booting the Ubuntu OS. Verify your settings accordingly. See the mounted image in the K: drive. Starting the VM When you re ready with the bootable CD or image, then click ‘start this virtual machine’. The VM will start and look for any bootable CD’s or images in the path we specified. If it finds the image, it will start to load. The OS will be booted within few minutes. Look the status bar for any error messages. If any one has a red cross mark in it, it means there is an error. You have to change the settings accordingly. Once you have loaded the OS the console screen will have a different cursor mark. You have to press ctrl+alt to switch between the host OS and the virtual OS (also called as guest OS) Installing the OS Installation is the same as real installation of ubuntu. select the language, time zone, keyboard layout. We ll see how to partition the virtual hard disk. This is how the partition looks like. Select ‘manual’ and proceed. click ‘new partition table’ to create a partition. It will show a warning message, click continue in that and proceed to the next step. create a swap area for 1GB and leave the remaining space for installation. After partitioning, the partition should look like the picture below. Give the username and password you wish in the next step In the next screen it will show the summary of all the steps. Click install. The installer will partition the drive accordingly and it will copy the files to it. After the installation VM will ask for a reboot in order to boot from the virtual hard disk rather than the CD image. Booting process You can easily find out from which the OS is booting, whether it’s a CD image or from the virtual hard disk. The first icon in the above image is CD drive, the second one is the Virtual hard disk, and the third one is the floppy drive. Since we have installed ubuntu in the virtual hard disk the second icon is shown in green color. The green color will blink in the background of the icon as shown in the figure. Installing VMware tools Vmware tools are the necessary modules for enhanced graphics and mouse movement. Select Install VMware tools from the VM menu. It will display a warning dialog, click install. An icon will be shown in the desktop with the name VMware tools. (Just as shown below) click the icon to open it. There will be two files. (one is RPM[redhat package manager] and other one is the tarball) Extract the tarball to the virtual hard disk. goto the terminal and locate the folder that you extracted and type ‘sudo ./vmware-install.pl’ The installation is easier and it will ask for the options, just next next type. (It will automatically detect the best resolution for your monitor and will wait for your confirmation) After the installation either reboot the VM or restart the X to see the enhanced graphics performance. Adding New Devices Adding sound adapter By default the sound adapter will be enabled. You might want to hear the sound from the Virtual operating system thro your speaker or headphone. How to do it? shutdown the guest operating system. select the VM from the inventory. press ctrl+D to view the settings. In the hardware tab click add. Add hardware wizard will be shown. Click next to see the hardware available. select sound adapter and click next Use the default sound adapter. Leave the ‘connect at power on’ option enabled. Adding USB devices USB devices are recognized by the VM’s. Either host OS or the guest OS can have a control of the USB device at a time. When you plug in a USB device, the control will be given to the host OS even if you have the guest OS powered on. To switch the control to the guest OS, select the USB device in the menu VM-> Removable Devices->USB Devices. Just select the device to switch the control. A notification will be shown in the system tray as ‘found VMware USB device’. Then the control will be with the guest OS. If you want to give the control back to the host OS then deselect the USB device from the menu. Adding a hard disk This is an advanced option. You can view, access the files of the host system inside the guest OS. To add the physical hard disk, Goto settings and click add in the hardware tab Add hardware wizard will open, in that click next. Select Hard Disk in the hardware types. In the next screen select ‘Use a physical disk (for advanced users)’. It will show a warning dialog when you click the next button. The warning says that ‘using a physical disk may cause loss of data or inability to boot’. Click OK. In the usage details select ‘Use entire disk’ instead of ‘Use individual partitions’ to access all the drives. The physical disk’s configuration will be stored in a virtual disk file. The wizard will lead you to this screen. Select finish to end the add hardware wizard. When you reboot the VM you can see your whole physical disk inside the guest OS. Some points to note: Check the status bar whether all devices are in the working state while booting. Only one operating system can have control over the USB device at a time. Always shutdown the guest OS rather than clicking stop VM button in the toolbar. You cannot edit the settings if you suspend the guest OS. Conclusion In this article we discussed the following. Booting an OS virtually Configuring the OS Adding new hardware devices to the VM I’ll discuss some of the miscellaneous options in the next part of the tutorial.
hi i downloaded win 95 iso file i have the vm workstation.. i saw your tutorial....but after loading the file on the cd drive i dont knw what to do.... it gives me option wether to support cd with cmd , without or see the help file... i go for with the cd drive... thn what to do next?
