07.09.07
Installing Feisty Fawn (Ubuntu 7.04) Server Edition on Parallels 3
I had some major issues again using the Server Edition of Ubuntu 7.04 to install a new virtual machine in Parallels 3. Ubuntu Server seems to have some things enabled in the server kernel that Parallels just doesn’t like. I also ran into a problem trying to use more than 512 megs of ram for the virtual machine. Hopefully this gets sorted out in the next update to Parallels, since I prefer to use 768 megs of ram for my virtual machine.
I used the latest version of the Ubuntu Server iso to install. I am assuming anyone using this install method is at least at an intermediate level of using Linux, so I’m not going to hold your hand too much. I am using Parallels 3 build 4128, and have done this install successfully 5 times now. I configure the virtual machine to use 5 gigs of hdd space, and 512 megs of ram. I run through the server install as normal, choosing the “install to hard drive” option at boot. The screens are pretty easy to handle, the hardest part is partitioning the drive, and you can just choose the “guided” option for that if you aren’t as picky as I am. As a note anything over 3 gigs of space should work for a virtual machine, I happen to use 5 gigs so I have some room to play with. I have a linux server that I can connect to over the network if I need more space than that.
Once the install finishes it will prompt you to reboot. Allow it to reboot but press the stop button on the virtual machine once it starts to load grub. Then go to Edit->Virtual Machine on the Parallels menu. On the virtual machine configuration editor, choose Options on the left, then click the “Booting” tab on the right. Look for the “Boot Sequence” section and select “CD-ROM, Hard Disk, Floppy” so it will boot from the iso again. This is important because you want the virtual machine to boot from the cdrom so you can get a shell and install the generic kernel instead of the server kernel. After you’ve changed the boot sequence setting, click “OK” and then boot the virtual machine with the green play button.
At this point parallels should boot the cd again. Choose “Rescue a broken system” from the menu and hit Enter. It should boot into rescue mode, it will ask you a couple of questions, similar to the install process. If you’re in the US and using english, you can pretty much just press enter at every prompt, until it asks about disks. On a guided or typical ubuntu install under Parallels the root filesystem should be /dev/sda1. Choose that one, and hit Enter. On the next screen select “Execute a shell in /dev/sda1″
Once you are at a shell, verify you have network by sending a ping to google or yahoo. You can’t do these next steps without your network working, since we’ll be using the network to update and install packages. We start with an update and upgrade, to get all the newest versions of installed packages.
aptitude update && aptitude -y upgrade
After this is complete, you want to install the generic kernel.
aptitude -y install linux-generic linux-image-generic
If everything goes smoothly and you have a decent internet connection, this process should take less than 20 minutes. After that, simply remove the packages for the server kernel.
dpkg -l | grep linux-image
This will show you the exact version of the server image you have installed. Use it in the next command for the last package if your version isn’t the same as mine.
aptitude remove linux-server linux-image-server
aptitude remove linux-image-2.6.20-15-server
Assuming you didn’t run into any problems, type “exit” to return to the rescue menu. Choose the reboot option, then stop the virutal machine with the red stop button. Go back to Edit->Virtual Machine on the Parallels menu, select “Options” on the left, then the “Booting” tab on the right. Change the boot sequence back to “Hard Disk, CD-ROM, Floppy”
Boot the Virtual Machine and it should get you to the login prompt. After you are logged in, install whatever software you would normally on your server setup.
A note, if you are using an actual cd instead of just having Parallels connect to an iso you downloaded to your mac, it may be necessary to choose Solaris 10 as your operating system for the initial install and “fix” phase. There have been reports of the cd emulation not working otherwise. Simply set your OS Type to Solaris, and the OS Version to Solaris 10 when you first configure the virtual machine. Use the process outlined as above, and once you are ready to boot the system, edit the virtual machine configuration again. Set your OS Type to Linux, and the OS Version to Ubuntu Linux.