In my previous post I described the steps for getting started with the PeopleSoft 9.2 virtual machine. Although I am still thrilled that Oracle has made this generally available, I am of the opinion that it would have even been greater if the virtual machine was pre-delivered with GNOME or KDE. I am sure that a lot of customers and partners will use this virtual machine, but is everyone comfortable with just a Linux command prompt? I think not.
Fortunately you have the root account and full access to the virtual machine, so we can go ahead and extend the virtual machine with the GUI our self.
Note, this post is not part of the virtual machine deployment as intended by Oracle. It is my choice to extend the virtual machine and it is your choice to follow this post.
First thing you need to do, is to enable the virtual machine with internet access to download the installation packages. The Host-only adapter I used in the previous post does not provide internet access. Stop the virtual machine if it is running. In VirtualBox, go to the Network section and enable a second NAT adapter (not overriding or removing the Host-only adapter).
When you boot the virtual machine, the NAT adapter will use the internet access of your host, assuming the host connected to the internet.
After the virtual machine is booted, type the following commands to get the latest yum repository.
cd /etc/yum.repos.d wget http://public-yum.oracle.com/public-yum-el5.repo
Now update the current installation with following command
yum update
After this, reboot the virtual machine with following command
shutdown -r now
After the machine is rebooted, it is time tot download and install GNOME. At the command prompt, type
yum grouplist
We need to download and install X Window System and GNOME Desktop Environment.
Type the following command to download the necessarily packages:
yum groupinstall "X Window System" "GNOME Desktop Environment"Answer all prompted questions with yes. Now the GUI is installed, but you need to enable it Linux to start in GUI mode instead of the console mode.
Edit the inittab file with following command
vi /etc/inittab
Change the line that states initdefault to 5 as shown above.
Reboot the virtual machine and the virtual machine will boot the next time in GUI mode. The first time I rebooted the virtual machine, X Window came up with a couple of errors. Unfortunately I didn't create a screenshot of this, but after responding OK to the errors, a window popped up to select a monitor. After selecting the default, I was running the virtual machine in GUI mode.
VirtualBox Guest Additions
For a seamless integration between the virtual machine and the host it is highly recommended to install the Guest Additions. The Guest Additions are mounted as a CD, but the virtual machine is not configured with a CD-ROM. That is why we will add a CD-ROM to the virtual machine first. Shutdown the virtual machine if it is running.
In the virtual machine Storage section click on the add CD-Rom icon and choose the leave it empty.
Boot the virtual machine and from the menu Devices, select Install Guest Additions.
This will mount the Guest Additions image. Prior to running the Guest Additions, some prerequisite packages have to be installed. Open a Terminal window and run the following command:
yum install gcc kernel-devel kernel-uek-devel kernel-headers
After this run the Guest Additions installer
After rebooting the virtual machine you can seamlessly use the GUI.
You said "I am of the opinion that it would have even been greater if the virtual machine was pre-delivered with GNOME or KDE.".
ReplyDeleteNot only GUI is not mandatory, but is also grabbing some more memory that you may want to save on your laptop. And for what added value ? You probably just want to start/stop the VM which doing much thing into it, do you ? So, whether I understand it's less Windows-click and seems old-fashion, that's good enough.
Nicolas.
Hi Nicolas,
ReplyDeleteWith these virtual machines everyone, that can download it, can run the virtual machines. And not everyone is a Linux user.
I know the virtual machine is meant to be used as a server and not as a desktop, therefor the GUI is not necessarily.
But the ones that are not that familiar with Linux and would like to modify or extend basic settings at OS level would appreciate a GUI.
I agree with you, but also want to provide the non Linux users more flexibility with the vm.
As I said in the post this is not part of the virtual machine deployment as intended by Oracle. It is my choice to extend the virtual machine and it is your choice to follow this post.
Hakan
Hi Hakan, I fully understand you.
ReplyDeleteMy intention was rather trying to explain why Oracle did not do it that way.
As far as I remember, Oracle Linux 5.x has the GUI built by default, so it seems they removed it on purpose. By the way, from Oracle Linux 6 onward the OS prompt (no GUI) has became the default.
Nicolas.
Hi Hakan,
ReplyDeleteAppreciated of what you have done to help others that are not Unix/Linux gurus.
BTW, can COBOL programs be executed in HCM92DMO/VM?
Best Regards,
Tony
Cobols are not compiled. You should install a Cobol Compiler and compile these first. After this you will be able to execute cobols.
ReplyDeleteThanks. So, Oracle did not deliver at least a trial version of COBOL compiler?
ReplyDeleteI could neither find cobol setup files nor was installed by default. I downloaded it from edelivery.oracle.com and used /opt/oracle/psft/vm/oraclevm-template-utils.sh script to install the 30 day trial version. I basically modified and used SetEnvVars(), SetAppbatchEnvVars(), CheckCreateCOBOLEnvironment(), InstallCobolLicense() and CompileAndLinkCobols() functions.
ReplyDelete