Skip to main content

VirtualBox: Another contender around the bend?


Some of the features of VirtualBox are:

* Modularity. VirtualBox has an extremely modular design with well-defined internal programming interfaces and a client/server design. This makes it easy to control it from several interfaces at once: for example, you can start a virtual machine in a typical virtual machine GUI and then control that machine from the command line, or possibly remotely. VirtualBox also comes with a full Software Development Kit: even though it is Open Source Software, you don't have to hack the source to write a new interface for VirtualBox.

* Virtual machine descriptions in XML. The configuration settings of virtual machines are stored entirely in XML and are independent of the local machines. Virtual machine definitions can therefore easily be ported to other computers.

* Guest Additions for Windows and Linux. VirtualBox has special software that can be installed inside Windows and Linux virtual machines to improve performance and make integration much more seamless. Among the features provided by these Guest Additions are mouse pointer integration and arbitrary screen solutions (e.g. by resizing the guest window).

A number of extra features are available with the full VirtualBox release only (see the "Editions" page for details):

* Virtual USB Controllers. VirtualBox implements a virtual USB controller and allows you to connect arbitrary USB devices to your virtual machines without having to install device specific drivers on the host.

* Remote Desktop Protocol. Unlike any other virtualization software, VirtualBox fully supports the standard Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP). A virtual machine can act as an RDP server, allowing you to "run" the virtual machine remotely on some thin client that merely displays the RDP data.

* USB over RDP. With this unique feature, a virtual machine that acts as an RDP server can still access arbitrary USB devices that are connected on the RDP client. This way, a powerful server machine can virtualize a lot of thin clients that merely need to display RDP data and have USB devices plugged in.

* Shared folders. Like many other virtualization solutions, for easy data exchange between hosts and guests, VirtualBox allows for declaring certain host directories as "shared folders", which can then be accessed from within virtual machines.


I just hope I have time to test this "YAVV" (Yet Another Virtualization Vendor) folkss' software.

If you don't have time (like me) then check out these screenies...
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Security: VMware Workstation 6 vulnerability

vulnerable software: VMware Workstation 6.0 for Windows, possible some other VMware products as well type of vulnerability: DoS, potential privilege escalation I found a vulnerability in VMware Workstation 6.0 which allows an unprivileged user in the host OS to crash the system and potentially run arbitrary code with kernel privileges. The issue is in the vmstor-60 driver, which is supposed to mount VMware images within the host OS. When sending the IOCTL code FsSetVoleInformation with subcode FsSetFileInformation with a large buffer and underreporting its size to at max 1024 bytes, it will underrun and potentially execute arbitrary code. Security focus
Post a Comment
Read more

Our frozen chi's and the Workfloor

I left home when I was 20. I had studied Physics(Major) and had no idea what to do next. I took to the seas, I think looking back it was more like a refuge, an asylum. Seeking to get away from all that peer pressure, myself and what not. 1991 June 7, around midnight I arrive in Lagos, Nigeria. Company agent ships me to the nearby hotel to wait for my first “boat”. That's the first time in my life I saw a lot of people , a race totally different from ours. I was warned to be careful, protect my wallet, but they came across as just about any other regular folk. That was my “first encounter”. Funny, since then I have worked with all kinds of nationalities (Japanese, Chinese, Malaysians, Indonesians, Dutch, Scandinavians, Thai, Americans, Spanish, Argentinians,..I can go on and on). What I have learned in all that is that we are all so much alike. But on board a ship it is “ really ” different. Your job is crucial and you must work together. That makes you accept each other realistica...
8 comments
Read more

A Collection of Threnodies : Part 1

Whale Fall ----------------- Dress me up in my new threads clasp my greasy palms grease my hair I'm ready for the fall Watch at all the decadence watching the avalanche I'm slipping down losing my buoyancy What's become of us where have we come this far, this close close to the doors I hear them, sublimal chants I'm on the run I race through the human sea I am the king! I'm the slave to my own undoings I'm the jester in my courtyard We jest as we run We're strolling on that thin rope we grope as we rope we're true heros we're the survivors we're the scavengers we're the friends we're the lovers we're the unbred Soon awaiting the fall we're lurking on us we're osedaxing us we're soon going to be done we'll soon be arrested *osedax(bone devourer, newly discovered marine genus) feeds on a fallen(sunken) whale carcass(which is also called a whale fall). Read more here
9 comments
Read more