Friday, August 15, 2008

Touching the Linux fantastic

It would be safe to say that historically I have tended to avoid Linux wherever possible. I think that was mostly because Novell (back in the day) forced it down our throats in the misguided belief it was a lot more than it actually was.

In hindsight I think my problem with Linux was in my approach. Novell trumpeted Suse desktop as a Windows killer (honestly) and I think I made the mistake of thinking of it like Windows. It is a whole different planet.

Time passes and we find ourselves in different situations. Novell now is a distant memory of pub quizes and futile team meetings. I work now in London for a company that reserve two rack slots for legacy Novell technologies and a server room for a whole load of everything else. Which includes Linux. I need to get my arse in gear.

Besides, now that Microsoft have burdened us with Vista, Linux should be a walk in the park.

The remit then was simple - to install openSuse and then on top of that vmware server - an old nemesis of mine from previous encounters with Linux.

The installing Linux bit went real well. Unless you’re running bleeding edge technology then these days it should do, depending on the distribution of course. Debian failed miserably at seeing any of my duo core hardware but openSuse breezed it. Hoorah.

Then I got into the trifling matter of vmware which likes recompiling itself. The trouble is the dialogue that comes with each section of the install might as well have been in a language from another planet. Worded in that obscure way that Linux help files often are. They can contain pages on pages of text telling you what is required in English, all verbs and adjectives that describe switches and mechanisms that make absolutely no sense at all.

So it was, that after completing the install of prerequisites like compilers and source code I found myself pressing page down through the license agreement. I felt if this was all for free - which vmware server is then the least I could do was check out the whole of the agreement.

The trouble is though that when you get to the end it just stops. And nothing happens. There is no box where you can type ‘I agree’ or even a message stating that all you need to do is press return to agree. It just stops and you go no where.

Of course this is where all the smug little Linux afficionados sit smug on that other planet of theirs and giggle into their vodka tonics. All mouthing inison: ‘Just press Q numb nuts.’

Which is all you have to do but until you find out that little gem the world can suddenly seem like a wonderful arena for random violence against inanimate objects.

So we get past the license agreement and press return past the first few questions.

And then it told me it would need to compile - coolio I was expecting that. And then it told me my compiler was the wrong version - by one digit at the end of a sequence of digits. It then informed me in that other planet way that continuing would probably mean everything I dreamed vmware was going to give me would likely fall on its arse just when I least needed it to.

So I did some research. Surely it was just a matter of installing the right version of the compiler. But the only version on offer was the one I had. So I did some more research. Was it because of my kernel version? It did not seem like it. Not for this particular issue. The kernel issues were just around the corner. One cheerful forum announced.

Eventually I found a walk thru of vmware on suse that flippantly explained that it always comes up with that message and you just have to ignore it and proceed anyways. Not so coolio.

So we march on, now with a sense that the end is nigh and very soon I will be able to tell people that I installed vmware on Linux and survived a recompile. My heart beat hard in my chest.

Then I ran into the kernel issues. In order to recompile vmware the install needed the source files. Which were diligently installed at the very beginning. But for some reason it could not find the source files. Despite my subsequently having installed, un installed, installed, rebuilt the damn server, installed, disabled the software update source, re-installed etc

Violence simmered at the edge of my frayed sanity but violence was not an option. My boss hadn’t gone home yet.

And then I had a moment of utter clarity. I was still trying to troubleshoot this as if it was windows, which roughly follows a logic hierarchy. I needed to start thinking like I was from the other world. Think chaos.

So I did and found that the source files it was looking for just did not exist despite being checked as installed. Why would that be the case. This was the standard kernel install, these were the standard kernel source files. And it was not working. Which could only mean that Suse for some reason had installed another kernel while I had my back turned, probably while I was pouring that last sambuka I spect.

A quick scuttle over to the software manager confirmed my fears. For some reason the default kernel was not installed but for some reason the pae one was. Which needed completely different source files to recompile. Arse.

So I uninstalled the pae kernel, installed the default with the correct version number and rebooted.

From there the vmware breezed and I soon connected to the server from a remote workstation. Hoorah. I immediately pulled out msdn and installed Windows XP as the first image. A balm to chaos and I breathed easy. Swaying back and forwards cradling my wireless keyboard.

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