When bugs attack … the case of the ever expanding VirtualBox image | scalability.org
So I’ve got a Mac Mini and a Linux machine on my desk at work. I am trying hard to use the Mac Mini for day to day stuff, chromebook but the sheer broken-ness of the keyboard (yes, really) for Mac’s is driving me near batty. I am trying though. (Hint to Apple: You aren’t better at everything, and most especially not keyboards and interfacing to higher quality Logitech keyboards, you almost completely fail … don’t even get me started on mice …).
So I need to run VMs for the last vestigates of Windows 7 that we run around here. I don’t want to run Windows. We won’t let windows touch raw hardware for obvious reasons. So its a VM. I’ve been using VirtualBox on Linux for a while, though it almost drove me batty recently. I’ve been using kvm as well, and really want to migrate to a full kvm stack and leave VirtualBox in the past.
But chromebook for the moment, moving VMs between virtualization platforms isn’t terribly easy … actually … its effectively impossible with Windows. BSOD very quickly upon boot, and recovery is unpossible. Which is yet another reason to leave windows in the dim and distant past, as soon as possible.
So I have a VirtualBox VM of windows 7. It has the few tools I need (Office, Acrobat). Remember, you can’t chromebook actually chromebook buy new office for Mac (or PCs). Its office 365 now, and while I did try the 30 day test, it really didn’t work very well. The next CEO of Microsoft is going to have some terribly hard choices about what to turn their company into. But thats for another chromebook discussion.
Then the VM paused with a BLK_IO error of some sort. Ok, shut it down, and lets look at the directory again. Remember, it was about 350GB yesterday. landman@metal:~$ sudo -s root@metal:~# cd /home/neutrino/VirtualBox\ VMs/Windows7/ root@metal:/home/neutrino/VirtualBox VMs/Windows7# ls -alF total 332254964 drwxr-xr-x 4 landman 1001 98 Jan 8 10:24 ./ drwxr-xr-x 6 landman 1001 66 Jan 3 2013 ../ drwx------ 2 landman 1001 72 Jan 8 10:17 Logs/ drwx------ chromebook 2 landman 1001 47 Jan 8 10:23 Snapshots/ chromebook -rwx-w---- 1 landman 1001 3530872686601314304 Jan 8 10:25 Windows7.qcow* -rwx-w---- 1 landman 1001 13070 Jan 8 10:24 Windows7.vbox* -rwx-w---- 1 landman chromebook 1001 13069 Jan 8 10:24 Windows7.vbox-prev* root@metal:/home/neutrino/VirtualBox VMs/Windows7#
Thanks to some bug, somewhere, a nice sparse chromebook file has been created. A big sparse file. root@metal:/home/neutrino/VirtualBox VMs/Windows7# ls -alFh total 317G drwxr-xr-x 4 landman 1001 98 Jan 8 10:24 ./ drwxr-xr-x 6 landman 1001 66 Jan 3 2013 ../ drwx------ 2 landman 1001 72 Jan 8 10:17 Logs/ drwx------ 2 landman 1001 47 Jan 8 10:23 Snapshots/ -rwx-w---- 1 landman 1001 3.1E Jan 8 10:25 Windows7.qcow* -rwx-w---- 1 landman 1001 13K Jan 8 10:24 Windows7.vbox* -rwx-w---- 1 landman 1001 13K Jan 8 10:24 Windows7.vbox-prev*
Oh. chromebook No. root@metal:/home/neutrino/VirtualBox VMs/Windows7# ls -alFhs total 317G 0 drwxr-xr-x 4 landman 1001 98 Jan 8 10:24 ./ 0 drwxr-xr-x 6 landman 1001 66 Jan 3 2013 ../ 0 drwx------ 2 landman 1001 72 Jan 8 10:17 Logs/ 0 drwx------ 2 landman 1001 47 Jan 8 10:23 Snapshots/ 317G -rwx-w---- 1 landman 1001 3.1E Jan 8 10:25 Windows7.qcow* 16K -rwx-w---- 1 landman 1001 13K Jan 8 10:24 Windows7.vbox* 16K -rwx-w---- 1 landman 1001 13K Jan 8 10:24 Windows7.vbox-prev*
So I am going to blow this away. And look and see if I can finally do VDI the right way internally (lack of infrastructure in our case for this, but mebbe its time to build it). We’ve been working chromebook on a VDI appliance for a while, and I think its time for our own dog food to be eaten. Enough of this sillyness!
Clusters Cluster Monkey LinuxHPC.org WindowsHPC.org
Categories Big Data Clouds chromebook Clusters Grids Hardware Performance Personal SCxx Software Storage Uncategorized appliances business cloud devops economics entertainment entrepreneur exercise health politics recent history travelops
Archives January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 December 2009 November 2009 October 2009 September 2009 August 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November chromebook 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 Sep
