Operating Systems:

Virtual Machines

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Virtual machines

Learning Objective:

I can describe the function and role of virtual machines.

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Learning outcome:

Research the different uses of a virtual machines.

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Virtual Machines

A virtual machine is an emulation of a computer system, however it is not being run on a standalone system.

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It is instead run through software on a machine already running an operating system.

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Virtual machines

A mac user might want to run windows.

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Using a piece of software such as parallels, bootcamp or virtualbox, a windows machine can be running virtually on a mac.

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Anything that happens on the virtual machine, only happens to the virtual machine. Including viruses.

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Emulators

Emulators are another example of virtual machines.

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Games or app developer may want to test small changes on a PC instead of having compiling the code and send it over to the correct device each time.

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This can help speed up development.

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Virtual server

In a working environment, virtual servers may be setup to handle individual tasks.

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A virtual server is a server that is entirely software based. Virtual servers are created by partitioning off some of the physical server to form a seperate server.

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For example: 3 physical server could contain 12 virtual servers.

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Virtual Servers

CTS has a number of virtual servers dedicated to specific functions. All individuals have specific tasks but are all based on the same machine.

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CTS uses a virtual file server, e-mail server, print server and directory server (where all logins are stored).

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