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How do I package ubuntu for virtual box in a ready-to-eat format so I can foist it on every person who owns a laptop? (that way they have NO barrier to use it: neither in the install or the required rebooting for dual boot)

Ubuntu has very poor out-of-the-box performance as a guest in virtual box due to the high dependence on hardware acceleration for it's all important eyecandy/perfectly-purple-pixels. For a usable system the virtualbox VM needs to be configured to allow 3D acceleration and Ubuntu needs specific drivers to benefit from this. How can I go about packaging the whole shebang so noobs get a ready to eat package?

Target Group: Noobs who show the slightest curiosity; acquaintances and distant family susceptible to cajoling, coercion and emotional blackmail; anyone with a new machine. More technical users can configure VBox machines themselves, setup dualboots or just ditch windows like I did.

I posted a question on launchpad a while ago but that is gathering dust.. (https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+question/232004)

Ideally I would like the Ubuntu iso to contain the drivers to support virtual box, since it too is an important "platform". My questions are :

  1. The drivers and extensions are under some GPL incompatible opensource license (CDL I think) Is there any technical/legal problem in including them on the iso? (there are ready to use debs on the official ubuntu repo already that use DKMS+source code)
  2. How can I file a request to include them on the iso? I had no luck on launchpad, either on my own or with my request for guidance.

Update:

The question has no reduced to "how do I ask for the virtualbox-guest-additions package to be included by default in the ubuntu 13.10 iso?"

staticd
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2 Answers2

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I don't know where you get that idea, but the guest additions, since version 4.0.0, are released under the GPL2 license.

You can check it in the source code if your are still in doubt. See this file for an example. Feel free to check others.

So don't worry about redistributing them with the rest of VirtualBox.

Another complete different matter is the Extension Pack, that contains things like usb2 support. This is not open source software and can't be distributed.

Javier Rivera
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To show off Ubuntu a virtual machine is the least alternative I would have thought of. It will leave users with the tragically wrong impression that Ubuntu is a sluggish, slow running, and hence unusuable OS.

In addition, other than the guest OS we will also have to configure the host to be able to run a VM fairly well.

So your project - as nice as it looks at first glance - will not lead to the desired effect. I would not recommend it, and the effort you will have to put in is not worth it.

Having said that, here are some nice guides for alternatives (but you can also get ideas for your project from these guides):

Community
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Takkat
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