running Linux at work with Windows apps

[bscott at ntisys.com]

On Mon, 11 Nov 2002, at 1:36pm, Scott.Prive at storigen.com wrote:
> I haven't tried Win4Lin... I need full-blown Windows sandboxes for
> testing, not individual applications.

  Win4Lin provides a reasonably complete "Windows sandbox".  It provides a
working BIOS, along with virtual video, sound, and network adapters, all
with native Windows drivers.  When you install Win4Lin, you feed it your
Windows CD, and you can watch it do the full install of Windows.  The
configuration for a Windows installation is kept in two directories ("win"  
and ".merge") in one's home directory.  One can create multiple instances of
those directories, and backup/restore/archive them as needed.  I do this
myself -- when my Windows install gets corrupted (as Windows often does), I
can simply restore my "win4lin-default-install.tar.gz" archive, and be back
up and running in minutes.

> I just completed a project where I would be running up to sessions of
> VMware simultaneously.

  WinLin supports multiple sessions as once, although each session must be
licensed.  They even offer a "Terminal Server" version, designed to export
Windows desktops to other systems.

-- 
Ben Scott <bscott at ntisys.com>
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