Virtualbox strangeness

I wanted to move a virtualbox virtual machine from my Mac to the new Fedora Linux box I have just got started. It has an AMD Sempron processor.

As it says in the instructions, I used VBoxManage clonehd to make a new VDI file, then copied it over to the Linux box.

The virtual machine was a 64 bit Ubuntu 8.04.

I used virtualbox to create a new Linux Ubuntu, then added the copied VDI file. However, when booting up it complains the I have a i586 kernel and not an X86_64. But I don't. The Fedora install is X86_64, I verified it with "uname -a". The package manager says that VirtualBox is for X86_64. The virtual machine itself is x86_64.

Is this a bug?

terminal that opens in finder

If you are on a Mac, you want to be able to open a terminal where the finder is.

First install iTerm instead of terminal.

Then follow the instructions here
http://cuasan.wordpress.com/2009/08/19/mac-open-iterm-here/

A lifesaver.

Fedora 11 is the winner!

I can't almost believe it. I managed to install Fedora 11, it worked absolutely perfect. So in my informal Linux contest, I hereby prounce Fedora the winner. The winning installer was Fedora-11-x86-64 DVD.

These are the series of blogposts documenting the contest.

http://macgnulinux.blogspot.com/2009/06/ubuntu-upgrade-problems.html

http://macgnulinux.blogspot.com/2009/08/yet-another-failed-debian-installation.html

http://macgnulinux.blogspot.com/2009/08/march-or-die-you-ubuntu-installer.html

http://macgnulinux.blogspot.com/2009/08/gentoo-attempt.html

http://macgnulinux.blogspot.com/2009/08/failed-fedora-11-attempt.html

http://macgnulinux.blogspot.com/2009/08/open-suse-failure-as-well.html

http://macgnulinux.blogspot.com/2009/09/more-failures.html

http://macgnulinux.blogspot.com/2009/09/final-horrors-with-ubuntu-and-debian.html

Final horrors with Ubuntu and Debian install

After failing to install to an old drive with data on, I have several blog posts about it here, I try a new fresh install overwriting discs. This should be simple to get to work. This is a fairly recent computer, I know it runs Linux with not much trouble, I have tried it before. This reinstall idea started when the Ubuntu apt-get got into a Catch-22 situation, and I saw a reinstall as the only solution.

First attempt is Ubuntu 9.04 Alterative installer AMD64. It does not detect the network with DHCP. Really. I tried it several times.

Debian 5.02 XFCE graphical installer. No Ext4 file system included. Whatever. I just want something up running. No problems detecting network, that was some problem with Ubuntu. It installs fine and I reboot. Then there is a slight problem, my screen (connected with VGA) turns into power-save mode some time after starting booting, so when it is time to enter my name and login I can't see the screen. The only way to get to see the screen is to push the power-off button, then the login screen appears. But then of course it starts to reboot so to no use. Now I could search for a solution if there is one, but I have no patience left.

Moving Xen img to virtualbox failure

I wanted to transfer a xen image with Ubuntu to run under VirtualBox. Because I can control VirtualBox using scripts and the command line, and VMWare which I usually use doesn't think that feature is interesting to us Mac users.

I downloaded then xen test.img file from the server to my Mac.

VboxManage convertdd test.img test.vdi

Create a new virtual machine, use test.vdi as disk.

My mac crashes and reboots!

I try to boot the virtualbox virtual machine up again when the Mac has rebooted. It starts to boot, but says no disk found.

Boot up with a rescue disc installed. It doesn't find a partition table. fdisk -l shows a /dev/sda but also says it doesn't have a valid partition table.

I made one attempt to look for bugs on the Virtualbox site, but didn't find a report. Maybe it is not with VirtualBox? For reference the exact version is VirtualBox Os-X 3.04 r50677

Next strategy is to determine exactly what Ubuntu version the xen vm is running, using lsb_release -r, install the same version as a new virtualbox virtual machine, and then transfer the interesting files from the img file. That will be good enough I think, and probably faster than analyze this problem in depth.

More failures

OK, I came up with a brilliant idea to install linux and save my home folder. First boot with a live-cd, remove /bin /sbin /usr and all those, preserving /home and /var (I got some files there). Then install linux. Now there can't be any old files in the way of the installation.

I tried Debian 5.02 but got the message failure to run chroot /target dpkg --force-depends --install /var/cache/apt/archive/base-passwd_3.5.2_amd64.deb var/cache/apt/archive/baise-files_5leeny3_amd64.deb

Now, maybe I should remove /var/cache also, and retry. Horrors! The problem is still there...

The Fedora 11. This installer said it could not mount /dev/vg1/root.

Ubuntu: The installer "Failed to remove conflicting files" and cannot continue. Now how had can that be? Even my retired aunt can remove files.
And by the way, which damn files?!!!

Now I give up. I am going to copy the home folder out, then reinstall a totally fresh OS on a newly formated disc.