Is it possible to simulate Linux on USB devices using VMware?

Question

I have successfully installed RedHat Linux and run them on harddrive using VMware simulation. Things work quite smooth if I put all the nodes VM on my physical machine.

For management purposes, I want to use USB devices to store ISO and plug one if more nodes are needed. I would like to run VMware on my physical machines.

Can I just build one virtual machine on one USB device? So I can plug one node if needed.

I mean, if I simulate machine A one USB 1 and another machine B on USB 2, can I build a network using my physical machine as server?

(1) If so, are there problems I should pay attention to?

(2) If not, are there any alternative solution for my management purpose?(I do not want to make VMs on partitions of my physical machine now) Can I use multiple mobile hard drives instead?

Actually I want to start up master-slaves Hadoop2.x deployments using virtual machines. Are there any good reference for this purpose?

I shall explain that am not too lazy to have a try on my idea, however, it is now rather expensive to do so if I do not even know something about the feasibility of this solution.

Thanks for your time.

Answer 1

I'm not an expert on VMWare, but I know that this is common on almost any virtualization system. You can install a system :

• on a physical device (a hard disk, a hard disk partition)
• or on a file

The physical device way allows normally better performances since you only use one driver between the OS and the device, while the file way offer greater simplicity to add one VM.

Now for your questions :

Can I just build one virtual machine on one USB device? Yes, you can always do it on a file, and depending on host OS directly on the physical device

... can I build a network using my physical machine as server? Yes, VMWare will allow the VM to communicate with each other and/or with the host and/or with external world depending on how you configure the network interfaces of your VMs.

If so, are there problems I should pay attention to?

• USB devices are pluggable and unpluggable. If you unadvertantly unplug one while the OS is active bad things could happen. That's why I advised you to use files on the hard disk to host your VMs.
• memory sticks (no concern for USB disks) support a limited number of writes and generally perform poorly on writes. Never put temp filesystem of swap there but use a memory filesystem for that usage, as is done for live filesystems on read-only CD or DVD
• every VMs uses memory from the host system. That is often the first limitation for the number of simultaneous VMs on a personnal system