Will the Pyra be good for schoolwork? (and other questions)

[Christoph.Krn]

I did all of that with the guest additions and it still didn't do it. My teacher couldn't even get it to work

I'm willing to help you with this problem, and I'm positive that we will be able to sort it out, but unless you provide more details I could only make blind guesses about the cause of the problem.
As is always the case when asking for technical assistance, it's best practice (and often essential) to list the exact steps that you've taken leading to the problem (in this case: how exactly did you install the guest additions, step-by-step?), provide information on the involved software (in this case: which guest OS / host OS / version of VirtualBox were used?), and other information that may be relevant. More information about this can be found behind the link How To Ask Questions The Smart Way which I provided previously.

 

[Spirit]

I'm not sure I will need it now since I only needed it for editing videos on a software I liked a lot. I got that out of the way, so Im good.

 

[rygD]

SVN und git are a bit like drop box. You can save files in them and restore the previous state. Multiple people can work on the same document on the same time and the changes will be merged automaticly (if possible).


I prefer VMWare to VirtualBox. The interaction is a bit easier and the VMWare Player is a bit faster. But VMWare is not open source .

I've had the opposite experience with VMWare.  It has a lot of finicky things about it that bug me to no end.  Just use what you are comfortable with. 

-Glyph Reader

Most of my troubleshooting VMs is with VMware Workstation, and there are frequently problems that seem to be specific to it, although this is often caused by people not understanding how things work and why they always get asked if they copied or moved their VM, which then causes issues with the guest OS as it deals with 30 virtual NICs.  Sometimes I have to step back and think about what is being done, but I have never had an issue where VMware was "causing" problems I could not overcome, even if things get a bit silly with some scenarios.  Although I am comfortable with it I prefer things that aren't proprietary.

I used VMware products a few times prior to taking classes and never had any issues that I recall.  I have also used VirtualBox a few times with no issues, but not enough to really compare the two.  I prefer just installing whatever I am planning on using unless I need more than one computer.

 

[Grench]

Any recommended VM software? I tried Oracles but couldn't get files from my PC to the virtual hardrive. I deleted it afterwards :I

I'm assuming you mean VirtualBox, which should be a fine choice for this purpose.

For things like file transfer between guests (the VMs) and host (your computer), arbitrary resolutions, shared clipboard, hardware accelerated graphics functions etc. to work, the guest systems that you install (Ubuntu, Debian...) will have to be aware that they are running inside a VM, and able to work together with the virtualization solution. If they don't do that right after you've installed them, then you will have to install what are called the /guest additions/ in VirtualBox terminology (these guest additions are to be installed on the guest system, not on the host system).


The official VirtualBox documentation (or an Internet search via your preferred search engine) has more details: Guest Additions for Linux.

I've used VirtualBox and VMware.  I prefer VirtualBox.  For me, so far, it has been easier to set up and maintain both on a headless server and workstation levels - and the VMs are very portable between the two.

For transferring data from your desktop to the virtual machine, stop thinking that they're on the same machine (even though they physically are).  Instead, consider yourself as 'remoting into' this VM that lives in it's own little world.  To connect to a resource you need to set up the resource as a network share on it's host (which can even be on the VM) then connect the other machine to that resource.

My favored server setup is to:

Use Debian as the root OS.  It gets no end-user accounts or even a GUI.  It is purely there to run the hardware and host the VMs.

Install VirtualBox

Build one or more Debian OS VMs in VirtualBox.  THESE servers are then surfaced to the end user(s).

Part of the magic in this is that I can set up a 12 core 16GB RAM server and host servers that appear to have 20+ cores and 40GB RAM among them.  It's easy and it isn't even sneaky.  Simply limit the VM to 50% of a physical core per logical core and allow the host OS to run a 50GB swap file to the RAID array.  Yes, if all of the servers were maxed out all at the same time, this could result in some slow-down.  It doesn't happen.  Especially when half the servers are file servers and not really using much for CPU and RAM.  By capping CPU usage of any given VM, it won't even collide if they're all tapped out on CPU.

Back to the Pyra for school work question though...

Yes, the Pandora and by extension Pyra can and will do pretty much anything you need a computer to do - until it can't.

I have backed up the OS from a router to my Pandora, loaded a new OS into the router's NAND, configured and managed it.

I have remote-controlled Windows and Linux machines from my Pandora with moderate success - the screen size and resolution means a lot of scrolling.

The things the Pandora can't do are pretty important sometimes.

Load and run anything that only has Windows binaries.

Import a highly formatted MS Word docx file properly.  (LibreOffice is good if you're building a document from scratch, but can't import complicated formatting from Word very well.)

See a whole web page at once - Pyra will be somewhat better at this with it's higher resolution.

Load and run anything that only has X86 Linux binaries - there is some hope on this one with some upcoming software support.

A 5-7 year old Thinkpad with a new battery may actually be a better option for the fact that it can do all of the above.

A Pandora or some day Pyra may actually be a better option for the fact that it fits in your front pants pocket.

 

[Wally]

Automatic message

This topic has been moved from "Off topic → Ask EvilDragon Questions" to "Pyra → General Talk".

 

[Maschinenherz]

My experience: the pandy is great when you have to be mobile. With libreoffice up to 20h battery, with external mouse and keyboard.... 5 to 8. But i extended it with a 12000ma/h powerbank. I made documents in my workplace, wrote long texts... emails...everything is fine... but consider one thing. After 2 hours staring on little text you have to be cautious not to crash with your head on it. you should go for big keyboard and especially screen. Pandy and pyra are best for private use, except you can always go on an big screen with it

 

[a.ginger.turtwig]

I'm not sure if we use the same Blackboard for school since the one I use is an application not a website, but I have not gotten it running on any arm device. Everything else works though.

 

[rygD]

There is Blackboard Mobile Learn, along with a bunch of school specific things, for Android, so I have no doubts it is working on ARM hardware.

I can't remember if I used the site on my Pandora (pretty sure I did) and see no reason why it wouldn't work on Pyra.

Can you point us toward this Blackboard software you use so that we can at least see what it is?

 

[a.ginger.turtwig]

There is Blackboard Mobile Learn, along with a bunch of school specific things, for Android, so I have no doubts it is working on ARM hardware.

I can't remember if I used the site on my Pandora (pretty sure I did) and see no reason why it wouldn't work on Pyra.

Can you point us toward this Blackboard software you use so that we can at least see what it is?

http://www.blackboard.com/Platforms/Collaborate/Overview.aspx