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  • #2264702

    Increasing popularity of Virtual Machines leading to increased use of Linux

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    by justme2007 ·

    I have always used Microsoft products. I develop in Visual Studio, I use SQL Server 2005 and all its components, Windows 2003, etc.

    I know I SHOULD learn Linux. I tried installing it once (before I had enough computer knowledge) and I killed my machine. I haven’t tried since because I was too lazy and Microsoft was already ‘good enough’.

    Now that Virtual Machine software is becoming more popular and affordable, I am really starting to look into it. I am looking at starting a business on-the-side with a Co-worker, and I have been thinking that this may be a great tool for our software development. (We don’t have much cash to start up.)

    However, if we continue with Microsoft, we will need to buy new licenses for every VM we run. That will get REALLY expensive really fast.

    So I am thinking that now is the time to learn linux (my co-worker already knows linux). I am wondering if anyone else here thinks that Linux (and other open source systems) will get more popular as VM get more popular? Also, do you think now is the time for me to learn Linux?

    Thanks in advance for the comments!

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    • #3274129

      Go for it – :-)

      by nimblebits ·

      In reply to Increasing popularity of Virtual Machines leading to increased use of Linux

      Ive been recently looking at linux, ive tested out various software and found that to my surprise that Linux is just as good as microsoft. Also as i am a student we use Solaris computers for programming so i researched a bit more about solaris, they allow businesses to download the OS free for servers etc – Ubuntu offers server capabilty. Im not too sure about Virtual Machine. But from what i can see i would recommend it. Im planning on buying a new machine and partitioning it and running Windows, Linux AND Solaris on it – It will be an interesting experience.

      • #3225421

        You don’t need VM, Linux will dual boot with dos to XP

        by michael_orton9 ·

        In reply to Go for it – :-)

        I have never had a problem with dual bootinng Linux and any version of windoze. However I do cheat and use Partition Magic to shrink the windows partition(s) and then create a windows saved work fat32 partition.
        Windows NTFS primary, the rest extended.
        In extended (windows won’t see it yet!) create windows saved workm fat32 and then linux swap, 512meg to 1 gig. Then leave the rest say 8 to 12 gig unallocated.
        Then reboot with SuSe 10.x cd#1 and just follow orders.
        You end up with GRUB boot loader and windows or linux choice. Both have read/write/edit access to the saved work.
        Trouble id you soon find you don’t then need windows!

        • #2502158

          Dead Computers

          by gsquared ·

          In reply to You don’t need VM, Linux will dual boot with dos to XP

          I killed two computers by installing Linux as a dual-boot with Windows XP and had to repartition the hard drives to fix them.

          I’m trying to learn Linux, and finding that there’s a very steep learning curve if I want to go beyond very simple basics.

          I’ve switched to running Linux in virtual PCs, instead of dual-booting, and am having good results with that. Also makes it much easier to save a copy of the virtual machine, play around with settings, etc., and go back to what was working before if I blow it up. As opposed to having to reinstall two OSes, I just use the old version of the virtual machine.

        • #2501601

          give Mandriva a go

          by neon samurai ·

          In reply to Dead Computers

          Mandriva is an RPM based distro that’s pretty well designed for entry to advanced level users. During the custom install, you get a good graphic partition app to setup your stuff but for best results, you should have your fat32/NTFS partitions setup ahead of installing winXP or use Partition Magic to reduce the partitions leaving empty drive space.

          Recommend:
          01 – ntfs partiton with the minimal space you need for OS and apps.

          02 – ntfs or fat32 with the minimal space you need for winXP user saved files unless you pickup a cheap NAS and use Samba shares.

          03 – native Linux partition in about the one to two gig size range for root (“/”) and apps

          04 – native Linux partition in about the two gig size range for user directories (“/home”)

          05 – native Linux partition as big as you can make it for application libraries and VM files (“/var”). If you give a winXP vm an 8 gig hard drive, you have to have 8gigs free under /var/lib/vmware/Virtual Machines/

          06 – native Linux swap partition equal to your ram though preferably double your ram (in the 1 to 2 gig range)

        • #2500877

          I suggest Ubuntu and GPartEd

          by rlovett ·

          In reply to You don’t need VM, Linux will dual boot with dos to XP

          A very simple install can be had by using an Ubuntu installation disk. It’s a complete package, and has GPartEd and GRUB built into the installer.

          Another benefit is that it is free!

          http://www.ubuntu.com

        • #2501548

          Missed the point

          by vbjackson ·

          In reply to You don’t need VM, Linux will dual boot with dos to XP

          I would agree that your sloution would work to run the system with EITHER Windows or Linux.
          The point of this article, however, is that with virtualization software you can have MULTIPLE OSs running AT THE SAME TIME.
          The problem is that if you have multiple instances of Windows Server running, you have to purchase a license for each instance.
          If you run Linux in each additional virtual machine, you don’t.

      • #2501605

        Welcome to the multi-OS world and freedome of choice

        by neon samurai ·

        In reply to Go for it – :-)

        I’ve not built a single-OS machine in years but then I collect OS like other people collect baseball cards.

        My current preference is dual boot WinXP/Mandriva Linux with VM for BSD, Debian, Mandriva, Dos, Win98, WinXP (licenses live on after MS exceeds hardware). I’ve VM also for liveCD ISO including Knoppix, ParillelKnoppix, Unbuntu, Kubuntu, Edubuntu, OLPC OS (one laptop per child is a great project). I need to add Solaris to the VM collection.

        I’ll leave the VMware appliance list for another time. Put simply, once you go multi-OS, you won’t look back.. even if it does take a beating and some hours infront of a book to learn Linux.

    • #3225427

      Linux is important and VM will help its diffusion

      by luciano.desiati ·

      In reply to Increasing popularity of Virtual Machines leading to increased use of Linux

      This is my opinion for many reasons :
      -VM permit to practise without dedicated HW
      -You can use your PC and run it only when you want/need it
      -Linux VM requires less memory than Windows VM
      -VirtualPC is free of charge and it works well enough with Linux
      -VMware provides also free VM player

      Bye,
      Luciano

    • #3225287

      Yes and Yes

      by binarypc ·

      In reply to Increasing popularity of Virtual Machines leading to increased use of Linux

      Linux is almost a mandatory tool now, even in the belt of die-hard Windows Admins. So, yes, learn it, it’s time. 🙂

      And yes, VM’s make it much more available, especially to people with just one or two machines. 🙂

    • #3289689

      something different….

      by jaqui ·

      In reply to Increasing popularity of Virtual Machines leading to increased use of Linux

      should you learn linux? and linux development?
      and cross platform development on linux?
      yes to all three, since they will be of benefit in many different ways.

      is using vm technology the way to do it?
      maybe not.
      a vm uses more ram, and is subject to the same limitations of the hardware you have, so you might be better off dual booting or having dedicated machines networked for your purposes.

      programming for GNU-Linux is drastically different than programming for Windows.
      if you don’t intent to release the software on linux, you don’t need the linux platform, saving the money to buy the dev tools for windows would serve you better.

      Do you really want to have to pick from the multitude of cross platform widget sets, the closest to windows looking being QT, and under a commercial license [ $2,400.00 USD for the QT dev tools to do commercial development ]
      wxwidgets, commercal license for commercial development.
      GTK/GDK, the only open source widget set free for any use, but not a really fancy bells and whistles kit to work with.

      do you use drag and drop for UI development?
      not in a linux tool set.
      use winde/crossover office to run the MS tools under linux?
      why use linux if that is the way you are going to go?

      even though I am 100% linux in my own environment, and strongly support the idea of learning it, if your planned business doesn’t include software for linux [ commercial license is legal, but not common ] then you would be wasting your own time learning it for the proposed business.

      you could look at Bloodshed’s Dev C++, it is available for both windows and linux, and uses gcc and the gnu dev tool set for development, under the mingw simulated linux console in windows, this would give you a chance to see what the gtk/gdk dev set would be like in a linux environment. This is one of the closest dev tool kits to MS Visual Studio from the open source world.

      • #3289655

        Sounds like you are

        by now left tr ·

        In reply to something different….

        Protecting your area of expertise from a budding contender(ers) in the same geographical area!!!

      • #2501659

        Added Linux Under Virtual PC

        by blackfalconsoftware9 ·

        In reply to something different….

        I have been working on a small software business for quite a while. Now that I have two new products coming out I am interested in porting them to Linux with MONO .NET.

        I installed Ubuntu 6.06 over the weekend under Virtual-PC 2004 with no problems. Looks like a very nice OS. And as soon as I am done pushing out my work to an upgraded business site I am turning my sights on MONO.

        I am tired of Microsoft’s erratic technology directions and though I enjoy using their development tools and .NET I want an OS that is much more technically stable than having every new whim added into it. This is also why all my machines still run Win2000. Its a solid OS with everything I need.

        • #2501590

          good on you

          by neon samurai ·

          In reply to Added Linux Under Virtual PC

          You may be even more pleased when you switch to *nix host/Windows guest setups. Even Windows runs better under *nix.

          You’ll also find quite a bit of advantage to usnig Linux on your business workstations. You’ll get a far better lifespan out of your hardware and better productivity from staff. (ie. those who don’t need a browser, don’t have one. half your hardware resoures are not dedicated to making the GUI look pretty.)

      • #2501592

        I’d also add; Mono will support your .NET on *nix

        by neon samurai ·

        In reply to something different….

        your developers can write in there confy .NET suite (if that’s what they know) and you can run the apps under win32 native or *nix with Mono.

        But still, the more OS and programming langauges you know, the better you’ll be.

    • #3289614

      VM’s are great for experimentation/DEV

      by Anonymous ·

      In reply to Increasing popularity of Virtual Machines leading to increased use of Linux

      Particularly if you can afford to buy VMWARE Workstation. It’s tools for cloning, snapshots etc… make it a quick and easy process to provision a new system for testing. You do, of course need more horsepower underneathit. Particularly RAM.

      It is also a great way to take a peek at Linux, if you wish to do so. It provides complete protection for you existing system, there are a number of prebuilt appliances which you can grab, saving you the hassle of initial install/config (This isnt’ that big a deal in the VMWorld though. Many of the distros, support VMWARE quite well, In fact I have had better success installing Debian in VM’s than I have ever had installing on Physical HW.

      As far as learning Linux? Jaqui already covered this quite eloquently.

    • #3289610

      Try Several Versions — Go For It!

      by w2ktechman ·

      In reply to Increasing popularity of Virtual Machines leading to increased use of Linux

      Yes, I believe after Vista that many may start turning to Linux. Not everyone though, the masses will still use MS. But, I have decided to move to Linux after XP, and started learning things as well. I have tried Fedora 4 and 5 (both gave issues with display settings on my system), so I moved to SUSE, which works fine on my system (even wireless).
      I too installed linux some time ago and gave up after I could not get my Nic card working, and went back to Win98. Since then though, I was surprised at how much better many Linux distros have improved. I am running SUSE 10 on 2 systems, and am getting ready to try 2 others that I recently downloaded.
      So, Go for it! give it a try, and dont just try one distro, try 3 or 4 of them to see which you prefer. If I gave up after the fedora problems, I would still be looking at being an MS B*tch forever.

    • #3289574

      Run Linux in a VM

      by garnerl ·

      In reply to Increasing popularity of Virtual Machines leading to increased use of Linux

      If you have the horsepower, run a VM with Linux in it. No more licensing issues if you don’t use authentic Enterprise versions (SLES, RHEL).

      • #2501566

        what licensing issues?

        by neon samurai ·

        In reply to Run Linux in a VM

        There’s no licensing issues that state you have to use Enterprise distros. Grab any Distro outside of a very few (Xandros, Linspire) and install it as many times as you like.

    • #2502376

      Linux install killed my machine

      by willjamr ·

      In reply to Increasing popularity of Virtual Machines leading to increased use of Linux

      Use a live CD, such as Knoppix.

      Insert live CD and boot. Try Linux.
      Shutdown and remove CD. Boot.

      No changes have been made to your machine!

      EDIT: PS. Running from a CD is *slower*

      • #2501842

        Thanks for the great response

        by justme2007 ·

        In reply to Linux install killed my machine

        Thank you everyone for the great response!

        So far I have tried Arch linux using Virtual PC. It has been interesting. The main reasons for considering linux are: reliability, efficiency and cost.

        Are business model is about selling software. It is more focused around highly scalable web development and business intelligence. (Ever read The Data Webhouse Toolkit by the Kimball group?)

        I doubt we will be able to afford a lot of hardware when we first start out, so I thought we could use VM to simulate separate servers, clients, and development machines. Running a very lean version of linux on these VMs could save us a lot of cash early on.

        However, right now all my development (at my day job) is done in Visual Studio and SQL Server. So this will be a big change. On top of that, I know nothing about non-microsoft data warehousing tools (SSIS for Oracle anybody?). So it is a bit of a scary jump. But I guess I am going to start.

        Who knows, if we can get some inexpensive development licenses, that may get us off the ground before we need to lay out the big cash when we go into production. However, that doesn’t address my concern about scalability and reliability.

        I guess my conclusion is that I will go ahead and learn linux, but I will have to keep digging to figure out which platform wil be best for the new business.

        Thanks again for all the comments.

      • #2500980

        Linux OS

        by mahmoodr46 ·

        In reply to Linux install killed my machine

        I am a novice but I managed to download and install ‘easys’ linux on my Acer TM522 notebook after several tries with the configuration modes. It looks good but does not recognize my wireless network adapter card but connects to internet via ethernet lan. Built-in Lucent Modem is also not accessible.
        Also USB flash discs are not accessible. Can’t figure out how to install downloaded software upgrades or drivers.

        I tried to load Mandriva One on my machine but it require lot of RAM I have only 128mb which is not enough so the system does not load.
        I have tried Knoppix too and liked it a lot but that too does not configure the wireless network adapter card. However, usb and lan are both working and accessible. Programs load very slowly and takes long time. Another drawback is that you cannot upgrade the softwares already included in the package.
        Linux developers should make the installation process and configuration more user friendly for novices.

        • #2500951

          Puppy Linux is small and fast

          by jeff.forssell ·

          In reply to Linux OS

          I’ve tried various Knoppix live CDs for a number of distributions and been quite impressed (considering they have to unzip everything into RAM.)

          Ubuntu I’ve even installed and it was working quite well but when I upgraded it got mashed (probably because I was using BootIt NG rather than the Linux Bootmanager).
          Installing Java was a bit of a hassle, but that’s supposed to be easy in the latest UBUNTU.

          Puppy linux is a small (only about 70 MB!) Live CD that has a lot going for it: Starts fast, doesn’t need a LOT of RAM, can write to it’s own CD if in a burner(!), easily creates a swap file so it runs quite fast.

          All of them were pretty good at recognizing my hardware.

        • #2500940

          a few points

          by jaqui ·

          In reply to Linux OS

          1) wireless network card generally do not have linux drivers, you have to use ndiswrapper and the windows drivers.

          2) Mandriva One is their live cd version.
          Mandriva will run fine on 128mb ram, I’ve tested even their latest with that little of ram.

          3) software management tools need to tell it which mirror to install updates and which mirror to install more software.

          unlike windows, which gets drivers written for it as well as starts everything just to make it easy, linux starts the minimum services, to get your usb drive recognised, connect it before you install linux. then it will be available whenever you connect it afterwards.
          [ or start editing the fstab file to add a mountpoint and device data line to use the usb drive. ]

          4) Lucent Modems are winmodems, you will have to go to linmodems.org to get thier tools to get specific chipset data to be able to get the kernel module source to drive it, then build the module and add a couple of lines to insmod to be able to use the modem designed to use ms windows to power it.

          edited for typo

      • #2501608

        Slower but still a life saver

        by neon samurai ·

        In reply to Linux install killed my machine

        Knoppix is pretty good at using a compressed partition format while still running fast. It runs with a little lag on my Toughbook27 but that’s more of a ram issue.

        Puppy Linux (as mentioned already) and Damn Small Linux are both far better for reduced hardware resources but your still not reading off a hard drive.

        As a tech tool; boot your Knoppix liveCD and you’ve got a complete OS. Mount the machine’s hard drive and silly things like user/admin passwords become irrelevant.

    • #2500954

      Changing from Windows to Linux

      by apetrovi ·

      In reply to Increasing popularity of Virtual Machines leading to increased use of Linux

      Has anyone tried the Xandros Linux distribution? It seems more geared towards people migrating from Windows and there are many compatibilities between the two OS’s. You can choose a Linux-style or a Windows-style layout. Installation is incredibly easy.

      • #2500777

        Take a look at Ubuntu

        by sallitt ·

        In reply to Changing from Windows to Linux

        I haven’t tried Xandros, I’m sure it’s probably very good, any Linux is better than Windoze.

        But I do recommend trying Ubuntu, it is very user friendly, performance is fantastic, eye candy is great, and Support forums and documentation answer every question you can think of.

        • #2502882

          only if

          by jaqui ·

          In reply to Take a look at Ubuntu

          you want to have the same malware problems that plague windows.
          Ubuntu and derivatives killed the security, making them no better than windows
          they bloated the os, making your system run 50% slower than it needs to.

          go sell ubuntu to non it people, who don’t care about getting screwed over rather than try to sell it to people who don’t like getting screwed over.

        • #2501729

          What would you suggest then?

          by waity85 ·

          In reply to only if

          I moved to linux about a year ago and wouldn’t go back. Using Kubuntu after a recommendation from a collegue(?).

          If you would suggest something better I’d always be willing to have a play with a new toy 😉

        • #2501726

          pick

          by jaqui ·

          In reply to What would you suggest then?

          any distro that does NOT disable the root [ system administrator ] account by default and you have improved drastically.
          [ how good is the security in all windows before xp or not part of the NT series? piss poor, no system administrator account. all the ubuntu distros, same thing, no system administrator account ]

          pick any distro that is MORE than one cdrom, and you have improved.

          unfortunately, most distros have picked either GNOME or KDE, both of which are nothing but bloatware so you can’t really find a distro that isn’t bloatware.
          [ not if it has the xserver included ]

          The single cd distros all try to emulate windows way to much, requiring software that has no purpose on most systems. [ pure bloat ]
          the benefit to thier bloatware approach, they do have the support for addon hardware, if you ever go buy a device that needs it.
          but using distro supplied packages to add that support is simple in all distros, so the bloat is just a bad decision.

          the software choices available on the single cd distros is laughable, even the debian based single cd distros leave 99% of available software out of the distro install options.
          [ since debian numbers 14 cdroms, it is the single largest distro in software options ]

          I personally prefer linux from scratch, which is not for most people. [ not everyone wants that level of control over their systems ]

          I can give you reasons why I won’t use most distros, including Red Hat’s Fedora and Enterprise, Novell’s Suse, Mandriva, Debian, Slakware, Gentoo and any of the hundreds of single cdrom distros left in the full list.
          [ those I listed are multi cd distros, not single cd distros ]

          Debian, default desktop environment, GNOME which requires smbclient libraries. in a 100% linux network, that is bloatware in the worst fashion.
          Red Hat’s products, same as Debian
          Novell’s Suse, not only the multimedia focused kde, but specifically they add Novell’s app armour, base the distro on RH, and install stupid crap like flash player, sun’s jvm and other space wasting garbage by default.

          Mandriva, they use KDE, and have added tons of un-needed multimedia crap I have zero use for, like Kat multimedia desktop search, the useless mandi interactive firewall.
          [ mandi won’t remember your inputs, so you constantly have to click on it’s popup messages for the exact same ip address ( localhost included, so printing causes a mandi popup to allow or not ) ]

          why are all distros requiring laptop utilities, for desktop installs?
          laptop utilities don’t work with ups devices, so they are pure bloat for a desktop workstation.

          why install more than one periodic command scheduler?
          and run them all by default?
          one will work.

          with your Kubuntu, try un installing bluez-utils, if you don’t use bluetooth devices, it will un-install the entire os.
          try removing firefox [ I’ll use seamonkey, same rendering engine as firefox, better user interface ] it will uninstall the entire os.

          if the *buntu distros work for you, great, just don’t try to convince everyone they are for them as well.
          I’ll tell you bluntly you are screwed then.
          every distro out there is because of problems with the other distros, and represent different chioces for which is right, respect that people can choose any distro instead of the original poster’s pushing crap on people and you won’t get slammed. 🙂

        • #2501704

          cheers

          by waity85 ·

          In reply to pick

          that’s definitely a more in depth response
          than I was expecting and will certainly
          give me some food for thought.

          I think I’ll take a look at Linux from
          scratch and see if it’s for me, its also
          the only distro you mentioned that I hadn’t
          looked previously.

          Thanks again

        • #2501513

          Jaqui…

          by sallitt ·

          In reply to pick

          Get a life…
          Seriously… Don’t shoot people down for making a suggestion.

          It’s not about “pushing crap”, it’s about giving people a starting point.

          Firstly I recommended Ubuntu because it is easy to use, give someone Gentoo for the first time, and two things will happen:
          1) They will never get it to work
          2) They will never look at linux again

          Secondly, root login is disabled for SECURITY reasons, if your not logged in as root there is less change of remote code execution while surfing the net. If you are really concerned about that, root login can be re-enabled if need be.

          Give first timers to linux a realistic suggestion that they will get working, once the comfidence is up, then try out some more exotic distro’s.

        • #2483901

          Right On, sallit

          by rlovett ·

          In reply to Jaqui…

          We weren’t suggesting that anybody suddenly change over their corporate network to Ubuntu. It sounded like people were interested in trying out Linux, and then, maybe, getting into a more in-depth examination of what Linux can do.

          Not everyone is as experienced or as expert as Jaqui is, I am sure. I enjoy fiddling with Linux, but like so many others, I do most of my work with Windows.

          I hope that the discussion has sparked some interest in looking around at alternatives.

        • #2483898

          re root login

          by jaqui ·

          In reply to Jaqui…

          disabling it is a 95% reduction in security.
          regular user password to do admin tasks is the same as running as root.

          so no root account is as secure as windows 3.1.1, 95 and 98, completely insecure.

          no root account by default puts any such distro on a par for security as microsoft’s products, zip. should never be used.

          try Vector, just as bad as *buntu for bloat, but not stupid enough to rip the heart out of multiuser security.
          try freespire (sic) the ex lindows distro.
          another ms wanna be that wasn’t stupid enout to diable root account.

          only the *buntu distros are that crazy, to ruin security completely.

        • #2485430

          Ubuntu killing security?

          by parrotnut ·

          In reply to only if

          Really? What flavor of linux would you recommend then? I have been experimenting with linux due to horrid malware problems with windows. Have found many live cd`s will work on my system and installed ubuntu (among a few others). Since security is my primary objective-what do you recommend?

    • #2500876

      Microsoft is already reacting by changing their Licensing Rules

      by bruce.maier ·

      In reply to Increasing popularity of Virtual Machines leading to increased use of Linux

      For example, if you purchase Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition R2 (not the pre-R2 version), you can run 4 children of versions as VM machines and not purchase additional licenses. If you purchase Windows Server 2003 DataCenter Edition R2 you can run an unlimited number of children (again, on the same box).

    • #2500784

      You do need Linux skills to compete.

      by tachyon ·

      In reply to Increasing popularity of Virtual Machines leading to increased use of Linux

      I would suggest that your best course of action would be to go out and BUY the retail version of SUSE Linux 10.2. It comes with the best manuals of _any_ OS and includes integrated Xen virtualization. It is also very easy to install, configure and use. You can then install the free VMWare Server and have two types of virtualization to learn on and use. ALso, as far as resume points and HR drones are concerned, Red Hat and Novell/SUSE are all that exist. So it’s worth learning one of those first. I’m not a huge fan of RH for various reasons. And in your case, Red Hat’s support of virtualization lags behind SUSE’s.

      I would learn and practice installing Xen VM’s and if you have more than one computer, moving live VM’s bewteen machines. Then setup several different servers running both linuc and Windows Server applications and practice administering and using these VM’s.

      There’s good information out there on learning Linux, and virtualization. Including much information from the three manufacturers I’ve mentioned.

      • #2501556

        or download the ISO legally and use the billion help forums online

        by neon samurai ·

        In reply to You do need Linux skills to compete.

        same great OS non of the introductory cost. Later, buy the support service if you find you need to have someone else’s head answerable incase of trouble.

        • #2501531

          Or, if you actually read the post….

          by tachyon ·

          In reply to or download the ISO legally and use the billion help forums online

          the point of buying it was to get the excellent printed manuals. Given we were talking about gaining Linux skills, and learning and using Xen (as well and VMware which has it’s own documentation). The SUSE manuals are invaluable for both purposes.

    • #2500781

      Why?

      by jamacdonald9 ·

      In reply to Increasing popularity of Virtual Machines leading to increased use of Linux

      You seem to know all of the MS products already, if you move to Linux you will have to learn a new OS and a new development environment.

      I am assuming that you want to develop this software for a profit (otherwise skip the rest and develop Open Source).

      You haven’t said what your target market is.

      How many Windows machines vs. how many Linux machines are in the market that is your target?

      You seem to be ready to jump without a clear idea of what you are jumping to.

      You need more than just an idea about a cool piece of software to build. Some rough idea of what your usiness plan is might be a good start.

      • #2502891

        jama brings up a good point…

        by mikemajor3 ·

        In reply to Why?

        you haven’t really said what you plan to do for yer business, and THAT will determine whether you actually NEED linux. true, it’s free; also true, so is most of the software you might create with it, or that will be competing with anything you write… oops, if that’s the way you were headed…

      • #2485820

        jamacdonald, see paul’s “Thanks for the great response” above

        by charliespencer ·

        In reply to Why?

        I think he’s looking to use it for an inexpensive server OS and other internal infrastructure, not as a development platform (yet). He’s trying to keep his start-up costs down.

    • #2501699

      VmWare Player

      by keith.hubner ·

      In reply to Increasing popularity of Virtual Machines leading to increased use of Linux

      I have two suggestions, the first is to use a pre-built image and use vmware player. This gives you a fully installed distro without the hassle of installing it and it can run within XP. There are tonnes of pre-built distro’s out there with pre-loaded software ready to use. I have used these in the past for testing web apps and also playing with linux firewalls. You can get them at:
      http://www.vmware.com/vmtn/appliances/directory/
      You will also need to download the free vmware player:
      http://www.vmware.com/products/free_virtualization.html

      The second option is to install linux onto a USB drive. There are many distro’s out there with USB images you can use. With the cost of these drives coming down it is a neat little solution when just experimenting.

      Hope some of this was helpful.
      Regards

      Keith

    • #2501610

      take the plunge; VM is far better under *nix

      by neon samurai ·

      In reply to Increasing popularity of Virtual Machines leading to increased use of Linux

      Check out Ubuntu or Knoppix liveCDs to testdrive. Knoppix is a standard in my tech tool kit since it’s a complete Linux distro with no install to the local machines.

      When I first got ahold of VMware, I installed both Windows and Linux versions. I build a Windows and Linux VM on a fat32 partition.

      Under Windows, the VMs run with some noticable lag; it’s like working under water, gravity is ther but everything is slow. Windows is pretty not efficient though so it was too be expected.

      Under Linux, VMs run with barely any lag. I opened the same VM off the fat32 partition so the only variable was the platform. I Even ran VMware through X (fully graphic to be close to Windows application stack). But then *nix is a performance primary, pretty secondary OS and the better use of hardware resources shows.

      I now routinely do anything that I have to do in a win32 environment under a WinXP VM on a Mandriva host OS. The only things I have to reboot to native WinXP for are devices that won’t provide *nix drivers, PalmOS sync over USB and Computer Gaming.

    • #2485860

      Large scale adoption of Linux in the financial sector

      by derek.smith ·

      In reply to Increasing popularity of Virtual Machines leading to increased use of Linux

      We are a large SA bank, and have embraced open source as a whole, with Linux as the OS for all of our major web and data base production systems.

      The financial benefits are huge in terms of savings realised in license fees, however, as you stated, the “laziness” needs to be overcome, with good techies required to drive the bus. We serve 1 million clients off our platform, with very little down-time experienced. My advice to you is to go for it !

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