Virtual machines on the Macintosh

From 2009 to 2014 I used VirtualBox, but today (November 2014) I think there is really only one serious contender in this space. It is Parallels.

The reason is their video driver. It works. The driver in VirtualBox and in VMWare Fusion is not good enough to work with ArcGIS Desktop. If you don't need high performance video, use VirtualBox. If you do, use Parallels.

History

2014 Started using Parallels 9

2014 November -- Parallels 10 upgrade

2015 Sept 2 today Parallels told me that version 11 is out. How many times will I have to buy it each year? Should I try the annual license? I chafe at those. Looks like upgrades happen in August and the cost is the same right now ($50 either way) so I am sticking with plan "A". I don't need any of the extra "Pro" features.

I am being suckered in by the "50% faster" statement in version 11. Probably means startup is faster not running machines.

Other things I like about Parallels

1. Parallels is so well integrated into the Mac OS. I can put the icon for a Windows app into the doc, and it opens! Wow. Behind the scenes it's running a Windows 7 virtual machine, but to me it just looks like the app is running from the desktop.

2. Sharing. Once the tools are installed in the guest OS, moving between windows, cut and paste, sharing files is all transparent.

Networking with Parallels

AKA what I don't like (so far)

I get confused about how to set up Linux virtual machines in Parallels, so I decided to document what I need to do right here.

Today I am setting up a PostgreSQL / PostGIS server in Ubuntu Server to do development on my Mac.

I successfully built the Ubuntu 14.04 virtual machine, but now it cannot connect to the Internet. In the Parallels virtual machine settings:

Hardware settings:
Network 1:
Connected (checked)
NIC Type: Virtio adapter (doesn't really matter)
Type: Bridged Network: Default Adapter

The rest of the set up takes place inside Linux. The machine needs to be set to get its network settings from DHCP. In "bridged mode" the virtual machine will be on the same network as your Mac. Using the Default Adapter setting means it can be on either the WiFi or ethernet adapter.

The big problem comes in cloning machines, the new machine gets a new MAC number and puts it at eth1 instead of eth0. Edit the udev file to fix it. Remove the old eth0 setting and change the new eth1 setting to eth0. Edit /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent

Help, one of my windows keeps jumping off the screen!!

Q. I ran for a few hours with two monitors then switched back to one. Now one of my running applications is off the screen! Yikes! My copy of ArcMap jumps off the screen when I unminimize it. How can I get it back?

A. Exit Coherence Mode. (Use ^-Cmd-C or see the "View" menu.) Now everything pops up in a single version. Reactivate Coherence and you should be able to get to all your windows again.