Fedora Core 4

[Void Main]

Might as well start the topic now:
http://fedoranews.org/blog/index.php?p=281

[dickinsd]

Like the sound of a faster boot up, I think it is a bit of a joke, my pretty standard fedora install takes loads longer than my Windows XP machine to boot up.

Code: Select all

- Xen and Virtualization

This starts by integrating the Xen kernel stuff, and going
from there.


what the hell is that on about?

Dave

[Void Main]

My Fedora machines boot a LOT faster than my XP machine. Maybe that's because I don't have an XP machine. :) Of course we don't talk about that nasty proprietary stuff here. It might also have to do with me not actually turning my machines off so boot time isn't an issue (except for my Laptop which boots just fine).

As far as Xen, is that something they are talking about including in FC4? Here's an article:
http://www.linux-mag.com/2004-10/xen_01.html

[dickinsd]

yes I was talking in regards to FC4, it was on the page that you originally linked too.

Thanks for the follow up link, sounds unreal, sounds impressive, but I can't actually imagine how it could do what they say it does/will.

I have a head ache now.

Dave

[Void Main]

Looks to me like Xen is open source VM (virtual machine) software. I currently use VMware for this so I can run multiple instances of Linux and UNIX at the same time. It's interesting that I haven't heard of it. The closest thing I knew of to VMware was Bochs. I will certainly look at it more closely when I get a chance because I would love to ditch VMware if possible.

[worker201]

Sounds interesting. Too bad it's only for x86. This sounds like it would be a really cool thing for the Mac.

[dickinsd]

can I just confirm that with xen you can run 2 seperate OS's at the 'exact' same time on one machine?

For example using *BSD for low level network stuff, routing etc AND running FC as a workstation or maybe server at the 'exact' same time?

I just can't get my head around this, does the machine boot up to xen and then boot FC and *bsd (or other) as well?

Sorry to be a pain in the a$$ but I think I am missing something or its just way over my head..

Dave

[Void Main]

Yes, that's exactly it, just like I run several OSes on my machine at exactly the same time. From a perspective somewhere else on my network it would appear there are several different machines running when in fact it's just one physical machine with several virtual machines running several different OSes. This has actually been happening for quite some time but on the home computer level it has only been around 4 or 5 years.

I was in disbelief until I installed my first copy of VMware. I have had as many as 6 virtual machines running at one time on my desktop system. I had 2 different Solaris x86 installations, 2 different Linux distros, Win98 and Win2k advanced server all running at the same time, all accessible on the network as if they were all installed on a separate computer.

As far as the OS knows, they *are* all installed on a separate computer, it's just that it's virtual hardware instead of physical hardware, but they don't know that. You can get a 30 day trial license and download VMware if you are interested in trying it out. I would suggest that you have at least 512MB of RAM for good results though.

There is also a way that you can currently run multiple Linux instances at the same time using something called "User Mode Linux". I actually like this as well for testing things. I have a debian installation in User Mode Linux that I will fire up from time to time. This is a little harder to set up but it does work very well. It's all free and open and you can find it here:

http://user-mode-linux.sourceforge.net/

Then of course there is another open source project that slightly resembles VMware that can run Win* but I don't believe it will ever be good enough unless they do a complete redesign. I hope I am proved wrong on this but it's called Bochs:

http://bochs.sourceforge.net/

Bochs is a lot slower because it actually emulates the processor, which means it could be portable across platforms. With VMware the processor is not emulated and all OSs have access to the real processor so they run at near full speed as if they were the only OS on the machine (as long as the other OS isn't using a lot of CPU).

That last LVM tip I created was done in a VMware virtual machine running FC3. I had a couple of screenshots in there. In fact I have some more VMware shots in other tips showing SUSE, win98, and Win2k server running in a VMware session:

http://voidmain.is-a-geek.net/i/ts-vmware.png
http://voidmain.is-a-geek.net/i/ts-vmware2.png

FC3 boot:
http://voidmain.is-a-geek.net/i/rescue1.jpg
FC3 rescue:
http://voidmain.is-a-geek.net/i/rescue2.jpg

[dickinsd]

Hi.

Just a quickie.

Does anyone know if FC4 Test1 is still likely to be released tomorrow?

Is it worth try to get hold of ASAP and installing to a secondary HDD straight away?

Dave

[dickinsd]

Well I am in the process of installing FC4 over FTP - this is pretty damned slow, I don't know if FTP installs are always this slow, or if they are just slower because EVERYONE is trying to get FC4 from the mirrors or if FTP is normally real fast, and I just picked a bad day?

Anyway, I just thought of something, after been told about synaptic for FC, I have grown to love this program it is an excellent package manager, and I think that is the thing I am gonna miss most if this FC4 ever finishes its install.

I wonder would anyone bother making an apt and synaptic for FC4 test1 or any of the tests for that matter, or is it not worth it until FC4 is officially released?

Dave

PS: The install is currently in the middle of installing my new kernel : 2.6.11-1.1177_FC4 and has suddenly preneted me with an estimated time remaining of 140 mins, which would appear to be a serious lie, OR the install is about to speed up big time.

EDIT: Ah, its one of them dodgy counters that count up instead of down, its already climbed to 150 min

[Void Main]

I never mess with the test releases personally, mainly because I do like Dag's apt repo support. The actual releases come out often enough for me and I usually install those on day 1 or day 2. It's only usually a matter of a few days after that for Dag and FreshRPMS repos to catch up. BTW, FTP installs are very fast for me if I install from a local FTP server but you obviously are installing for the first time from a remote server, a server that's probably bogged down with other people doing the same.

[dickinsd]

yeah I am using a remote server:

ftp://sunsite.mff.cuni.cz/pub/fedora/test/3.90

and yes I think all the mirrors (in europe anyways) are bogged down tonight

Oh well, I like the fact I am getting to try this install method anyway.

Dave

[Calum]

harvey the desktop is still on red hat 9.0! (yes i got fed up with slack not liking my printer), i can't believe it's up to Fedora 4 already! is there a way to creep up the version numbers without too much reconfiguration required from red hat 9 do you think? (ie, red hat 9 up to fedora 1, and so on)? i am kind of limitd bandwidth wise too, so maybe i should get a fedora install set from one of those cd burning places and just backup my fstab, hosts, profile files and so on and reinstall.

[worker201]

Calum, I'll mail you FC1 on cds, or FC2 or FC3 on dvd if shipping costs are not too expensive. Let me know.

[insomnia]

Seems it's release is delayed cause of it's name...