10.4 Installing an OES 24.4 VM Guest

Creating an OES 24.4 virtual machine requires you to complete the following major tasks.

10.4.1 Specifying Options for Creating an OES 24.4 VM Guest

The Create Virtual Machine Wizard helps you through the steps required to create a VM guest and install the desired operating system.

  1. Launch the Create Virtual Machine Wizard by using one of the following methods:

    • From the virtualization host server desktop, click YaST > Virtualization > Create Virtual Machines

    • From within Virtual Machine Manager, click New.

    • At the command line, enter vm-install.

    If the wizard does not appear or the vm-install command does not work, review the process of installing and starting the virtualization host server. The virtualization software might not be installed properly.

  2. After specifying that you want to create a virtual machine, click Forward.

  3. Click Forward.

    The option to set up a virtual machine based on an existing disk or disk image is supported only if the existing disk or disk image was originally set up through the Create Virtual Machine Wizard.

  4. On the Type of Operating System page, select the supported version of SLES for the OES, then click Forward.

    The Summary page is displayed.

    NOTE:Detailed explanations of the Summary page settings are available in Virtualization: Configuration Options and Settings in the Virtualization guide.

  5. Click Name of Virtual Machine.

  6. Specify a name for the virtual machine in the Name field, then click Apply.

    For example, you might specify hostname_vm, where hostname is the DNS name of the server you are installing in the VM.

  7. Click Hardware.

    1. Specify the amount of initial and maximum memory for the virtual machine to consume from the available memory. The initial memory should not be less than 2048 MB.

    2. Specify the number of processors that you want the virtual machine to use.

    3. Click Apply.

  8. If you want to change the graphics adapter settings, click Peripheral Devices and select the type of graphic support desired, then click Apply.

  9. Click Disks.

    The Virtual Disks dialog box lets you create one or more virtual disks that the OES VM guest has access to. If you are installing from a DVD on the host server or from an ISO image file copied to the host server’s storage devices, these are also listed as virtual disks.

    Initially, a 10 GB file is specified for the partitions/volumes on the virtual server. The default location of the file is /var/lib/libvirt/images.

    By default, this is a sparse file, meaning that although 10 GB is allocated, the size of the file on the disk is only as large as the actual data it contains. Sparse files conserve disk space, but they have a negative impact on performance.

    The OES installation guidelines recommend 10 GB for a server installation. Keep in mind, however, that you are defining the total local disk size for the server. You should allocate as much local space as you anticipate the server needing for data and other files after it is hosting user services.

    1. Specify the hard disk space you want to be available to the virtual machine.

    2. Click OK.

    3. To create additional virtual disks, click the Harddisk icon in the Disks wizard.

  10. If you are installing OES from a downloaded ISO image file, click DVD, browse to the OES image file, then click Open > OK > Apply.

  11. If you want to change the network adapter settings, click Network Adapters, view the default setting, then edit the default settings.

    or

    Click New and specify the setting for another network board of your choice, then click Apply.

  12. Click Operating System Installation:

    1. If you are installing from a downloaded ISO image, ensure that the OES image is specified as the Virtual Disk installation source.

    2. If you are installing from a network installation source, specify the URL for the OES network installation source.

      You specify a network installation source for OES during the install.

    3. If you are using an AutoYaST control file to specify the settings for a virtual machine operating system, specify the path to the file in the AutoYaST File field or click the Find button to the right of the field to locate the file on the local host server.

    4. If necessary, use the Additional Arguments field to specify additional install or boot parameters to assist the installation.

      For example, if you wanted to specify the parameters for an IP address of 192.35.1.10, a netmask of 255.255.255.0, a gateway of 192.35.1.254 for the virtual server, and use ssh to access the installation from another workstation, you could enter the following parameters in the Additional Argument field:

      hostip=192.35.1.10 netmask=255.255.255.0 gateway=192.35.1.254 nameserver=192.35.100.100 domain=example.com usessh=1 sshpassword=password

      or

      ifcfg=eth0=192.35.1.10/24,192.35.1.254,192.35.100.100,example.com ssh=1 sshpassword=password

    5. Click Apply.

  13. Click OK to start the virtual machine and launch the operating system installation program.

  14. Read and accept the license agreement, then continue with Section 3.4, Specifying Network Settings.