Virtualisation

(or virtualization if you are from across the pond)

I love virtualisation! I have been using it in one form or another since circa 2005 and it just has so many uses:

• Evaluating software that you don't want to install on your main PC.
• Testing your own installs on a virgin OS.
• Testing against multiple operating systems.
• Running alternative operating systems i.e. run Linux on your Windows desktop and vice versa.
• For remote support so you don't have to install all manner of weird and wonderful VPN Clients on your main PC.
• Being able to hack together a temporary server without needing a physical box.
• Converting your main PC from physical-to-virtual (known as P2V) so that you can rebuild your PC but still be able to use a virtual copy of your old PC until the new build is fully up, configured and running.

The list just goes on... The best bit? Because competition is so fierce in this arena, most of the decent hyper-visors (the software that lets you run virtual machines) are free!

I hope to blog more on virtualisation (especially the new "Boot from VHD" option in Windows 7 - which also works on Vista with a little hacking about) because it is so cool and I have plenty of tips and tools to share. In the meantime, check out some of these:

VirtualBox - my favourite desktop hyper-visor. It is open source and ahead of the game. One of the coolest features is that it will not only boot images from it's own native virtual hard disk format (vdi) but it will also boot from VMware images (vmdk) and Microsoft's format (vhd).

Microsoft Virtual PC and Microsoft Virtual Server - both good but the latest version of VPC which only runs on Windows 7 has only just caught up with some of the features offered by VirtualBox for ages such as a seamless mode (XP Mode) and USB support.

Microsoft Hyper-V - the successor to Virtual Server and should be great, but not yet tried it as I don't have a server with a compatible CPU. Hyper-V can sit on top of Server 2008 (a type 2 hyper-visor) or you can install Hyper-V Server as a standalone bare metal install (a type 1 hyper-visor) i.e. it is not running on top of Windows.

VMware - great hyper-visors backed with years of experience, but not my cup of tea and I don't know why.

Citrix XenServer - looks very good, but don't have a couple of spare servers with compatible CPUs to play with.

There are other hyper-visors out there, go and find the right one for you.