[lug] Installation of multiple Linux Instances

[George Sexton]

My approach is to have two hard drives. Something big, and something 
more modest (40-80GB).

Install the OS on to the small drive. Once you've got the system setup 
the way you want, boot off something like knoppix and dd the whole image 
onto the second drive as a file.

Then, at any point you can boot off knoppix and reset the state to a 
known configuration by using dd to write the image file back to the 
small hard drive.

I do this with Windows images for installer testing. I can keep images 
of Vista, Vista Korean, XP, Server 2003, etc all available. If I hose 
the installer I can reset the image back to a known state.

I was doing this with a virtual machine, but the performance just was 
terrible.

kevin kempter wrote:
> Hi List;
> 
> I have a new dev server. As an independent consultant I want to maximize 
> it's use. Some of my clients use RedHat/CentOS 64 bit, others 
> Redhat/CentOS 32bit, some are even using Fedora and Debian.
> 
> Here's my thought:
> 
> I'd like to install each OS/version into it's own space on the disk.  
> I'm thinking all I have to do is install one OS (say CentOS 64bit) and 
> partition say 20% of the disk. Then once the install is done, boot into 
> the latest fedora disk and do the same, etc.
> 
> Is this correct ?
> 
> Later I want to add a disk array and allocate a RAID mount point that 
> can be mounted by any of the installed Linux'es when it's active.
> 
> Is this do-able ? Easily ?
> 
> 
> Thanks in advance...
> 
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-- 
George Sexton
MH Software, Inc.
Voice: +1 303 438 9585
URL:   http://www.mhsoftware.com/