First Look: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5
Two years in the making, RHEL 5 is finally ready. The result? With Xen, SELinux, the Red Hat Global File System, and more, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 raises the bar for commercial Linux. We break down the new features and walk you through creating your first virtual machine.
Wednesday, March 14th, 2007
Creating a Virtual Machine
Next, let’s try to create a virtual machine on two different computers. The first is the Xeon- based IBM x3950 rackmount server[ that was reviewed recently in Linux Magazine]; the second is a generic, Pentium III computer.
Figure One, taken from the x3950, allows you to choose either paravirtualization or full virtualization, since the hardware supports virtual machines. Figure Two, however, indicates that the processor lacks virtualization features, and provides only the paravirtualization option.
Next, you must name your virtual machine. This is not a hostname; rather, choose a name that describes the purpose of the machine. You also need access to an image of the operating system to install in the virtual machine — you can choose a local file or a file located on the Internet. FTP and HTTP URLs are supported. You must also specify a disk space quota, a memory quota, and a processor quota. The exact settings for the latter three parameters may reflect a physical system you’re replacing with a virtual one. Figure Three shows the memory and processor allocation dialog. Figure Four pictures Fedora Core being installed on a virtual machine.
