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Running GUI Linux in a virtual machine on a Mac

developer.apple.com

121–130 of 206 posts

Re: Running GUI Linux in a virtual machine on a Mac

#121
post #112
post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't run the Linux x64 binary on macOS ARM. You run the Linux x64 binary on Linux ARM inside a VM on macOS ARM.

It seems overly complicated. Is there any benefit over using Docker?

Docker is equally complicated under the hood.

Re: Running GUI Linux in a virtual machine on a Mac

#122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/7.0.0_BETA3/Virtu... ;)

For those not in tune with virtualbox, this beta lets you run 32-bit x86 guests on aarch64 macOS

Sadly it does not appear to work that well..

Quote:

There has been no port to M1/M2. All there has been is early work that does nothing useful but somehow escaped the stables. You can safely forget all about it for now.

[0] https://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=106919

Re: Running GUI Linux in a virtual machine on a Mac

#123
This is how I do most of my work.

Mac and Windows frequently perform non-consensual changes to my workstation. On the other hand, GNU/Linux is challenging for me to get working 100% on bare metal.

This setup is reasonably fast for my work, which is mostly text editing.

Re: Running GUI Linux in a virtual machine on a Mac

#124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Our solution was to run Linux native on all dev machines. Docker really is a Linux tool and it works much better under Linux. We were running JetBrains IDEs and doing mostly Go, Python and JS development, so the switch was pretty easy and painless. The switch also dramatically reduced developer time spent solving Mac/Linux incompatibilities in tooling, and let us focus more on our product. Overall we accelerated deve…

What hardware and distro+kernel version are you using? I am trying to do this on a 12th gen. Intel Dell XPS, and to be honest the hardware support isn’t great. I had to install an upstream 5.19 kernel (rather than 5.15 that ships on Ubuntu 22.04). Sill, at least 2-3 times per week the machine fails to wake from sleep and has to be hard rebooted. Meanwhile my M1 Pro Mac 14” MBP routinely goes 3-4 weeks uptime, with re…

I just switched from an XPS 15 to an LG Gram. In both cases, I thought I had problems, until I bit the bullet and set up Ubuntu (well, in my case, Kubuntu) to do secure boot. Then everything just worked, except for the fingerprint reader.

Re: Running GUI Linux in a virtual machine on a Mac

#125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

GNU coreutils are essential on macOS, and Apple should just include it by default. \o/

Um… GNU’s license is incompatible with Apple; that’s why Bash 3.2 is the current version for macOS.

Not incompatible, except with Apple's business model; Apple has been removing GNU software for more than a decade:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3559990

Re: Running GUI Linux in a virtual machine on a Mac

#126

Are there any good, free desktop hypervisor apps for ARM macOS at this point? I always used VirtualBox on Intel but they don't support ARM guests on ARM hosts so I've been stuck using qemu, which is not so great performance-wise. I know I can use the APIs linked here but I would rather not build my own hypervisor client if at all possible haha

UTM. It's a GUI for both QEMU and the native macOS hypervisor framework

Re: Running GUI Linux in a virtual machine on a Mac

#128
post #121
post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems overly complicated. Is there any benefit over using Docker?

Docker is equally complicated under the hood.

Yes, but it's a single command to run, without the need to learn the internals, if the use case is just to run the binary.

Re: Running GUI Linux in a virtual machine on a Mac

#129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Our solution was to run Linux native on all dev machines. Docker really is a Linux tool and it works much better under Linux. We were running JetBrains IDEs and doing mostly Go, Python and JS development, so the switch was pretty easy and painless. The switch also dramatically reduced developer time spent solving Mac/Linux incompatibilities in tooling, and let us focus more on our product. Overall we accelerated deve…

I swear I'm not trying to be facetious, not trying to stir the same old tired "hurrr year of the linux desktop" shit... I have to ask: you accelerate development by 1 day/week, but do your devs lose any time with the accumulation of tiny annoyance such as sorting out bluetooth/audio/hibernation/battery drain?

> I have to ask: you accelerate development by 1 day/week, but do your devs lose any time with the accumulation of tiny annoyance such as sorting out bluetooth/audio/hibernation/battery drain?

No. All of the above have been fine - save hibernate. Standard kit is a multidevice logitech bluetooth keyboard and mouse... no issues. A couple of the devs on my team use bluetooth headsets, and that too is no problem. The LG Gram gets about 16-19 hours on a battery, so we've not had drain issues. Audio hasn't been a problem. We did have issues with hibernation when we switched, and solved it by disabling hibernate, and setting the machine to sleep when the lid shuts. I've left my laptop in the bag, sleeping all weekend and had 70% battery on Monday morning. Incidentally, the battery is really not critical... 65W USB3 chargers are cheap so we mostly run plugged in.

Your mileage may vary. Incidentally, LG is making a great machine right now. Huge 17" display, metal case, keyboard has a numeric keypad, great battery life, and it weighs 1 oz more than a 13" Macbook Pro. Oh, and lots of ports.

Re: Running GUI Linux in a virtual machine on a Mac

#130
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like I pretty much have full control over my Mac laptop. Why would you expect to fully control a machine from inside a VM anyway? Sounds like a massive security risk too.

> I feel like I pretty much have full control over my Mac laptop. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25074959

Oh please. You are quoting an issue that happened two years ago and Apple has already acknowledged that their algorithms were crappy and promised to reengineer this stuff. This is like claiming that Linux does not allow you to install software because a repository happens to be down.
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