How to run Windows and Linux at one place?

BANGALORE, INDIA:With the latest release of VirtualBox, Windows and Linux can be run together simultaneously, and you don't even need to switch between the two. Using the seamless Windows feature of VirtualBox, you can run two different operating systems simultaneously on a single PC and you can use the applications of both operating systems from the same desktop simultaneously.

This has been made possible by the combined efforts of VirtualBox and SeamlessRDP that is meant for seamless Windows support for rdesktop. The rdesktop, ie, the remote desktop feature helps in creating X11 Window for each Windows application that you will run from the host machine, further the application that is running can be moved and resized.

In this article, we will show you how you can seamlessly work with Windows and Linux together without switching Windows of virtual machine.

Prerequisites

Before we proceed, you should have the latest VirtualBox 1.5.2 installed on your system. For this download VirtualBox 1.5.2 rpm for openSUSE 10.3 from the link provided in the direct hit box. For installation first navigate to the folder where you have downloaded the rpm file and then run the following commands in the terminal.

# /etc/init.d/vboxdrv setup

For running VirtualBox, navigate to Computer > more application and on the new application section click on the 'Innotek VirtualBox' icon.

Integration

Now create a new virtual machine for Windows XP. You could also do it for otther Windows versions also. Once the virtual machine for Windows has been created, a few changes need to be done to the guest OS. Open the registry editor from start > run >'regedit' and press enter. In the editor Window navigate to the 'HKEY_CURRENT_ USER > Software > Microsoft > Windows > Current Version > Policies > Explorer' on the right panel create a new DWORD and call it 'NoDesktop' and set its value to 1. This is done so that the desktop of the guest OS is not visible, only the guest taskbar and the guest application is visible on the Linux desktop (ie host desktop).

You are now required to install VirtualBox's Guest additions for seamless mouse movement between guest OS and host OS. For this click on the 'Install Guest Addition,' under 'Device' menu item within the virtual machine running the guest OS. Once this option is selected a virtual CDROM drive will appear on the guest OS. Explore the virtual drive and click on the 'Install Guest Additions' to initiate the installation, follow the in stallation instruction to finish the installation process.

Once the installation is complete properly shutdown the guest operating system ie click on Start > Shutdown.

Reboot the guest operating system, and when it's fully ready, click on the 'Seamless Mode,' under 'Machine' menu. Finally you will see the Windows task bar on the Linux desktop and you can now work seamlessly with both OSs.