We are retiring a Unixware 7.1 server that has custom applications on it. It has Raid 5 and we would like to use the machine for other things. Is there a way we can image/clone to virtual machine file and run that VM within say Virtual PC 2007 or VMware? I am not aware of anything to do this. I have downloaded VMwares converter but it only supports Linux and Windows.
Your help is appreciated.
Thank you for the link but while that link tells me of the versions of linux that can be ran in hyper V or VMware, it does not tell me how to take an existing install of SCO Unixware 7.1 with apps installed and mods on a live machine and make that entire RAID 5 installation into an image and convert that image if need be to run in VM ware. Sorry for the runon.
This is what I need.
Do you have a link to how this might be accomplished with another (Linux/Windows) operating system?
I just did this today using VMware Vconverter located here.
VMware vCenter Converter Standalone
Basically this will do LINUX and Windows. All you do is install it on the PC you wish to keep your VM's. Then while the other computer you want the image of is running, it loads a client and then creates a VM is about 15 minutes. All this is done remotely over the network with proper credentials on the "to be imaged machine". I just loaded this up into VMware's VM player and it works perfectly.
I read some of the topics in their forum, and it appears that it changes device drivers to a standard set during the process?
If this is correct, then I think that the approach should be to do a fresh install, and restore the application programs and data.
That will require a programmer to redo the 8 years of work he has done. We cannot afford that. Another option is to use Ghost to ghost the entire Raid 5 (if that will work) and convert it to a VM.
I don't understand why the programming has to be re done?
How would you handle failure of the RAID controller, and then finding out that it is no longer in production, and there is no replacement that uses the same device driver?
We first started off with a Version of SCO about 20 years ago and had to migrate over to UnixWare 7.1. We run a ERP system on this server called FACTS. When we upgraded to the newest version of FACTS, we had to go to UnixWare from SCO. Anyway, in order for FACTS to play right and achieve the functionality that we wanted, we hired a programmer to modify SCO/FACTS to work right. When we upgraded to UNIXWare 7.1, the same thing happened. This programmer who now owns FACTS, did all out programming needs since we do not have the expertise or the money now. If I do a fresh installation in a VM, I am going to reload Sco and FACTS. Call teh programmer, pay him some crazy amount to reduplicate what he already has done. Then upgrade to Unixware 7.1, upgrade FACTs and do it all over again and pay this guy tons of money that has already been spent.
Only one person uses this server now. We are not dependant on it except for some old account information that our credit departments needs once every 2 months.
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In regards to the RAID 5, I was hoping someone would be able to help me on this. I am sure what will happen in UNIX. Can we Ghost this Raid 5 and restore it to a single drive then I ghost it from there and convert it to a VM? I am not sure. That is why I am here asking questions.
I think that the simplest solution is to:
Hmm. Will the restore to a single IDE drive on the new system be impacted by the Raid 5 SCSI array from the old system?
No. The operating system sees the RAID5 as a single system disk. The host adapter does all the nitty gritty of which spindle has what data etc.
All that happens is that the kernel is rebuilt with a different disk controller driver.
Nice. So basically we can do this with an off the shelf hard drive with no formatting or software installation needed. Just boot off the Microlite DVD correct?
OK. As I stated, I am a noob. Once I download the microlite software and burn it to a cd. How do I install it in UnixWare and then how do I run it?
Complete instructions are in the Microlite Documentation, but essentially:
Download the program, copy it to cd or over the network, run install.sh.
Start edgemenu, it's all menu driven, create a backup and a boot cd.
You will need to read the section in the manual to create the target boot cd, and may need assistance at this point.
When you boot the new machine with the cd, it will run the equivalent of fdisk, format, divvy and restore.
Thank you so very much for your patience with me and for your time. I will let you know what happens.
However a CD or DVD will not do. A complete back up is going to be over 300GB and we are having to us a tape backup. How is this going to work since we can not longer boot off of a CD?
I am assuming that the current tape drive is SCSI.
After you have done the backup on the old system, remove the tape drive and scsi host adapter, and install it in the new system.
Do the restore to from the tape.
If however, the SCSI host adapter is built into the motherboard, or is a ISA, EISA etc card that will not install in the new system, you can still copy the data across the network after you have created the new system.
Also, assuming that the 300gb is uncompressed data. You would need about 15 dual layer dvd's to do the copy.
We already had a copy of Microlite on the server too. It was version 2.0 though. it made four boot disks. We installed the tape to the destination machine and booted off the discs. We used an optiplex 320L with 1 GB RAm but it kept crashing. We booted it up to 2GB and it got to the 2nd disk and did like a BSOD but UNIX version.
Is the microlite 2.0 version too old to do this? Could it also be that this PC is all USB for keyboard and mouse or am I just way off base.
Here is a PIC.
If there are standard PS2 keyboard and mouse ports, I would try that first.
Second, do a fresh install of Unixware (practice run) to see if there will be any problems.
If the disk controller in the old machine is not the same as the disk controller in the new machine, you may have a problem with the emergency boot diskettes. I have never tried this with Unixware, only Open Server. It may be neccessary to do a fresh install, install microlite, and just restore the non root file systems.
Here is a pic of the error.