Comments on: All busy on the Western front http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front scratched tallies on the prison wall Sat, 06 Sep 2008 16:06:03 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6 By: Chris Procter http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99540 Chris Procter Sun, 09 Sep 2007 18:11:00 +0000 http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99540 Must remember to sign my posts :) Must remember to sign my posts :)

]]> By: Anonymous http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99539 Anonymous Sun, 09 Sep 2007 18:09:38 +0000 http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99539 Just to explain, both the issues Laszlo talks about involve two machines accessing the same filesystem at the same time which a recipe for pain, any changes one makes to the partition (changing a file, allocating inodes, updating metadata etc) happen without the second knowing anything about it so its stupidly easy to end up with an inconsistant/corrupt filesystem, espeacially when you allow for buffer caching in ram etc. There are ways of doing it safely with cluster filesystems like GFS or OCFS but without them you need to hard power off one of the machines (known as STONITH or Shoot The Other Node In The Head). Shutdown acesses the filesystem so is potentailly as dangerous as not shuting down. Just dont do it m'kay? Just to explain, both the issues Laszlo talks about involve two machines accessing the same filesystem at the same time which a recipe for pain, any changes one makes to the partition (changing a file, allocating inodes, updating metadata etc) happen without the second knowing anything about it so its stupidly easy to end up with an inconsistant/corrupt filesystem, espeacially when you allow for buffer caching in ram etc.

There are ways of doing it safely with cluster filesystems like GFS or OCFS but without them you need to hard power off one of the machines (known as STONITH or Shoot The Other Node In The Head). Shutdown acesses the filesystem so is potentailly as dangerous as not shuting down.

Just dont do it m’kay?

]]> By: BrokenCrystal http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99526 BrokenCrystal Sat, 08 Sep 2007 23:06:57 +0000 http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99526 While I found your blog posting most informative and very interesting, as I was reading (I am not a skimmer) I was in anticipation that the next new thing you would be talking about is what is going on with Jackfield... Unfortunately I reached the end of the article, but found no information on my most anticipated project for the Linux desktop. I was wondering if you could post an article on Digg, asking for assistance from the community to get the ball rolling? Maybe if you were to contact some of the developers from Compiz Fusion, you may get better assistance? They love eye candy as much as I do... ;- ) One similar but limited project comes to mind... Screenlets. I remember them talking about working with the Jackfield developer when they were first getting their project started. I am not sure if that offer still stands...? Thanks again for your time, BrokenCrystal While I found your blog posting most informative and very interesting, as I was reading (I am not a skimmer) I was in anticipation that the next new thing you would be talking about is what is going on with Jackfield… Unfortunately I reached the end of the article, but found no information on my most anticipated project for the Linux desktop. I was wondering if you could post an article on Digg, asking for assistance from the community to get the ball rolling? Maybe if you were to contact some of the developers from Compiz Fusion, you may get better assistance? They love eye candy as much as I do… ;- ) One similar but limited project comes to mind… Screenlets. I remember them talking about working with the Jackfield developer when they were first getting their project started. I am not sure if that offer still stands…?

Thanks again for your time,
BrokenCrystal

]]> By: Gary Fleming http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99525 Gary Fleming Sat, 08 Sep 2007 22:00:46 +0000 http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99525 Stuart/Laszlo: I've done this from the same article you suggest, and one other issue with using a real windows partition in VMWare is that Windows Genuine Advantage (has there ever been a more inappropriate name for software?) does not like it at all. I've had the image throwing it's hands up with a "this system has not been checked" error, fixed that by reverifying (which is somewhat unreliable), later booting into windows on the real machine, and getting hit by the same problem. I wouldn't recommend it unless you plan on only booting physically or only booting virtually. Stuart/Laszlo: I’ve done this from the same article you suggest, and one other issue with using a real windows partition in VMWare is that Windows Genuine Advantage (has there ever been a more inappropriate name for software?) does not like it at all. I’ve had the image throwing it’s hands up with a “this system has not been checked” error, fixed that by reverifying (which is somewhat unreliable), later booting into windows on the real machine, and getting hit by the same problem. I wouldn’t recommend it unless you plan on only booting physically or only booting virtually.

]]> By: Adam Williamson http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99523 Adam Williamson Fri, 07 Sep 2007 17:52:58 +0000 http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99523 Wait - providing incomplete specifications on a supposedly 'open' interface in order to try and ensure that all third-party implementations are inferior and cast reflected glory upon the first-party implementation...isn't that what Microsoft's been doing for decades? Why are we celebrating when ATI does it? I suggest that anyone working on an open source driver for an ATI product trust anything ATI release exactly as far as they can throw it (if it's tied to a very heavy rock). After all, ATI have specifically professed their intention that the drivers based on the information they release should be inferior to ATI's own drivers. Given this, why would anyone sane trust their information? Wait - providing incomplete specifications on a supposedly ‘open’ interface in order to try and ensure that all third-party implementations are inferior and cast reflected glory upon the first-party implementation…isn’t that what Microsoft’s been doing for decades? Why are we celebrating when ATI does it?

I suggest that anyone working on an open source driver for an ATI product trust anything ATI release exactly as far as they can throw it (if it’s tied to a very heavy rock). After all, ATI have specifically professed their intention that the drivers based on the information they release should be inferior to ATI’s own drivers. Given this, why would anyone sane trust their information?

]]> By: sil http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99522 sil Fri, 07 Sep 2007 16:17:51 +0000 http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99522 Laszlo: nice. I'll set that up for dad. Cheers! Laszlo: nice. I’ll set that up for dad. Cheers!

]]> By: Laszlo http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99521 Laszlo Fri, 07 Sep 2007 16:06:07 +0000 http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99521 I did this exact thing at work so I can always run Ubuntu, but still get my email in Exchange. My company has images for all the computers so it wasn't an option to install directly into VMWare. I used this tutorial: http://www.advicesource.org/ubuntu/Run_Existing_Windows_Instalation_On_Ubuntu_With_Vmware_player.html Basically you have to edit the vmdk file to contain your particular drive geometry. One think that is *very* important is that you don't try to write to the same disk with two operating systems. That means if windows in running in VMWare, unmount the windows partition in linux so you don't accidentally write to it. Also once I started the VM from inside linux, and didn't select "Windows" on the grub menu. So VMWare tried to load Ubuntu while Ubuntu was running directly on the hardware. I'm guessing that this has the potential to corrupt your disk, and after I did it, Ubuntu would no longer boot. Luckily the damage wasn't too bad and all I had to do was boot the live CD and run e2fsck. The best way to avoid this is to never restart the VM (just suspend it) so you never get the option to boot into linux. I did this exact thing at work so I can always run Ubuntu, but still get my email in Exchange. My company has images for all the computers so it wasn’t an option to install directly into VMWare. I used this tutorial:
http://www.advicesource.org/ubuntu/Run_Existing_Windows_Instalation_On_Ubuntu_With_Vmware_player.html

Basically you have to edit the vmdk file to contain your particular drive geometry.

One think that is *very* important is that you don’t try to write to the same disk with two operating systems. That means if windows in running in VMWare, unmount the windows partition in linux so you don’t accidentally write to it.

Also once I started the VM from inside linux, and didn’t select “Windows” on the grub menu. So VMWare tried to load Ubuntu while Ubuntu was running directly on the hardware. I’m guessing that this has the potential to corrupt your disk, and after I did it, Ubuntu would no longer boot. Luckily the damage wasn’t too bad and all I had to do was boot the live CD and run e2fsck. The best way to avoid this is to never restart the VM (just suspend it) so you never get the option to boot into linux.

]]> By: sil http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99520 sil Fri, 07 Sep 2007 13:38:20 +0000 http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99520 Justin: ah, that's not quite what I mean. I don't want to permanently convert his Windows installation to an image; what I want to do is leave it as a dual-boot but allow a virtualisation program to run *the installed Windows* as a VM inside Linux as well. This is what Parallels can apparently do. Justin: ah, that’s not quite what I mean. I don’t want to permanently convert his Windows installation to an image; what I want to do is leave it as a dual-boot but allow a virtualisation program to run *the installed Windows* as a VM inside Linux as well. This is what Parallels can apparently do.

]]> By: Justin http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99519 Justin Fri, 07 Sep 2007 13:18:30 +0000 http://www.kryogenix.org/days/2007/09/07/all-busy-on-the-western-front#comment-99519 There is a tool called VMware Converter that will do a physical to virtual (p2v). It will also import previously made vm's from other sources; vmware and otherwise. However, it currently only supports Fat16,32 and NTFS when converting a p2v. So your dad could get a copy of Converter p2v his Windows installation. Install Workstation on his Linux install and run his p2v inside the Linux install. There is a tool called VMware Converter that will do a physical to virtual (p2v). It will also import previously made vm’s from other sources; vmware and otherwise. However, it currently only supports Fat16,32 and NTFS when converting a p2v. So your dad could get a copy of Converter p2v his Windows installation. Install Workstation on his Linux install and run his p2v inside the Linux install.

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