Pretty Vagrant – the easiest way to get Oracle XE21c running on Ubuntu

It’s been a few months now since the latest version of Oracle’s excellent ( and free) Express Edition (XE) database was released and it’s about time I got it installed and running so I can have a play.

Fortunately, due to a bit of DevOps sorcery called Vagrant, getting my hands on Gerald Venzl’s latest effort is easier than ever.

What I’m going to cover here is :

• an overview of the tools we need
• installing Vagrant on Ubuntu
• cloning the Oracle vagrant-projects Github Repo
• installing Oracle 21c XE using Vagrant
• some useful vagrant commands

Installing and Configuring an Oracle Developer Day VirtualBox Image

It’s winter. I can tell. First, it’s still dark. Secondly it’s bitterly cold.
Standing on the platform at Milton Keynes Central, it would appear that we now have further evidence that being late is a train driver’s prerogative.
Hiking up the season ticket price is obviously the prerogative of train operators.
The last time I spent this much money to feel this cold, I found myself standing on the top of a mountain in the South Island of New Zealand.

Unlike the “Great” British Railway, installation and configuration of an Oracle Developer Day Appliance is somewhat simpler, not to mention more reliable.

What I’m going to cover here is the installation of a Developer Day Appliance in Virtual Box as well as some settings you might want to tweak to gain access to the Appliance Database from the Host OS.

Installing VirtualBox on Mint with a CentOS Guest

Christmas is almost upon us. Black Friday has been followed by Small Business Saturday and Cyber Monday.
The rest of the month obviously started on Skint Tuesday.
Fortunately for all us geeks, Santa Claus is real. He’s currently posing as Richard Stallman.
I mean, look at the facts. He’s got the beard, he likes to give stuff away for free, and he most definitely has a “naughty” list.

Thanks to Santa Stallman and others like him, I can amuse myself in the Holidays without putting any more strain on my Credit Card.

My main machine is currently running Mint 17 with the Cinnamon desktop. Whilst I’m very happy with this arrangement, I would like to play with other Operating Systems, but without all the hassle of installing/uninstalling etc.
Now, I do have Virtualbox on a Windows partition, but I would rather indulge my OS promiscuity from the comfort of Linux… sorry Santa – GNU/Linux.

So what I’m going to cover here is :

• Installing VirtualBox on a Debian-based distro
• Installing CentOS as a Guest Operating System
• Installing VirtualBox Guest Additions Drivers on CentOS

The gedit bug with Shared Folders in VirtualBox – a Workaround

The trouble with a Virtual Machine is that it’s, well, virtual. Sooner or later, you’re going to want to transfer some files back to the host.

Unfortunately, gedit seems to have a bit of a problem getting it’s head around this process. When you do try to change a file in the shared directory, gedit complains :

Could not save file path to file on shared folder
Unexpected error: Error renaming temporary file : Text file busy

All is not lost however. Yes, this does appear to be a bug, but there is a solution that will enable you to continue using your favourite Gnome editor inside Virtual land.
For this you will need :

• a local folder on the Guest OS
• a shell script
• an alias in .bashrc
• some sticky-back plastic

OK, so I made that last one up.

Installing Ubuntu in VirtualBox on a Windows 7 Host

It’s Sunday afternoon and Deb is feeling poorly…but not so poorly that she’s not offering considerable editorial input into this post. In between the sniffles and requests for lemsip etc…she’s throwing in various comments relating to various icons from the sci-fi genre. To be fair, I have borrowed her laptop as it’s the only one in the house running Windows 7.
I will attempt to minimize the in-jokes and references but I thought I’d better go on record and report the fact that I am under some duress here. Honestly, some people are soooo geeky !