Virtual Box 4

Virtual Box 4 is the latest edition of the freeware virtualization software offered by oracle.

New Features in this version.

• Reorganization of VirtualBox into a base package and Extension Packs.
• Major changes to the GUI.
• VMM: support more than 1.5/2 GB guest RAM on 32-bit hosts
• New virtual hardware.
• Improvements to OVF support.
• Resource control: added support for limiting a VM’s CPU time and IO bandwidth.
• Storage: support asynchronous I/O for iSCSI, VMDK, VHD and Parallels images
• Storage: support for resizing VDI and VHD images; see chapter 8.21, VBoxManage modifyhd.
• Guest Additions: support for multiple virtual screens in Linux and Solaris guests using X.Org server 1.3 and later
• Lot of other improvements.

see http://www.virtualbox.org for details and changelog.

Seamless View - One of the great features of VirtualBox is the ability to switch to seamless view. Once the virtual machine is running select - "Machine" - "Switch to Seamless mode".

Virtual Box 4.0 running WindowsXP in seamless mode

see more screenshots below.

Virtual Box Manager Screen

Settings - General

Settings - System

Settings - Display

Settings - Storage

Settings - Audio

Settings - Network

Settings - Serial Ports

Settings - usb

Settings - Shared Folders

Windows Like Task-bar in Ubuntu 10.10

I find the Gnome DockbarX really convenient to use. This really resembles a Windows 7 Taskbar environment. see screenshot and installation details below.

DockbarX Screenshot

Installation Instructions.

1. add the required repository.

"sudo add-apt-repository ppa:dockbar-main/ppa"

2. update

"sudo apt-get update"

3. install

"sudo apt-get install dockbarx dockbarx-themes-extra"

4. How did i get the ubuntu icon on the left of dockbar?

- right click panel

- add to panel

- select "main menu"

- move the main menu to the left of dockbar.