vmware

[Brent Larsen]

for those of you who are curious,
here is more detail on the problems (and fixes) I was having with VMware  
thin clients seems.

I tried troubleshooting by installing the vmplayer right on the server (to  
see if it was a network problem) when I try to boot the virtual machine  
 from the network, it works!

It turns out that 32 MB of ram seems to be the minimum allowed in order to  
start x.  If I have less than that, it boots me to a text login screen  
that says:

ltsp login:

and no combination of usernames and passwords seems to help me.

but with 32+ mb of ram, it can start gdm, and ask me to login--when I run  
vmware right there on the server.  However, when I try it from the client  
PC, it fails, so I got to testing it further.

I finally got it working, and it seems that the wireless connection on the  
laptop isn’t connected fast enough to the LAN to allow the root file  
system to be mounted.  I believe this because when I turn off the  
wireless, and plug a copper network wire into the laptop, the vmware  
virtual thin client suddenly can boot to a gdm login, and I can use that  
virtual machine just like my other edubuntu clients.

which brings me to my next question:
how fast does the ethernet need to be in order for a client to "work"?
--or-- is there some built in reason that I cant mount nfs across a  
wireless connection?

As I think about this, I have to remember in the back of my head that to  
the virtual machine, it thinks that the network is ethernet, not wireless.  
(its the host pc that us using wireless, not the virtual thin client.)

Is there an alternative to vmware for running a client inside of a hosted  
operating system.  When I open the edubuntu workstation application called
"Terminal Server Client"  it offers to let me connect to a vnc server, or  
a UPD server, but not an ltsp server.  I understand that it isn’t an ltsp  
client, but it seems kind of odd to install an edubuntu workstation, then  
tell it to start a terminal server session, and it cant find the edubuntu  
server.

anyway, one of the reasons I needed vmware to work was so that my laptops  
could boot up, get wireless working, and then become edubuntu thin clients  
through the wireless, does anyone think that this is going to be  
possible?  is there an alternative?

thanks in advance for any advice.
-brent