OrielOS home OrielOS home

Try OrielOS in a virtual machine

You can try OrielOS without touching your PC's own system by running it in a virtual machine. This guide shows how to build OrielOS, turn it into a virtual machine disk, and start it in QEMU on Linux or in VMware Workstation on Windows.

OrielOS is in early development, so there is no download yet: you build the system yourself from the source code. It takes about half an hour the first time. Known limitations lists what it can't do yet.

What you need

  • A PC with a 64-bit Intel or AMD processor with virtualisation turned on in the firmware settings, at least 16 GB of memory and about 60 GB of free disk space.
  • Linux, or Windows 11 with WSL2 (the Windows Subsystem for Linux). The commands below run in a Linux terminal, or in a WSL2 terminal on Windows.
  • Podman, QEMU's qemu-img tool and, for QEMU, QEMU itself with UEFI firmware. tools/check-env.sh in the source code checks what is missing and tells you how to install it.
  • For VMware: VMware Workstation on Windows (tested with version 25).

The commands need administrator rights and ask for your password through sudo.

1. Build OrielOS

Get the source code from GitHub, then build the system image:

git clone https://github.com/OrielOS/OrielOS.git
cd OrielOS
tools/check-env.sh
tools/build-image.sh --no-archive

The build downloads Fedora and the NVIDIA driver, and prints the image's name at the end, for example localhost/orielos:dev.1. The same image is also called localhost/orielos:latest.

2. Make a virtual machine disk

tools/make-vm-disk.sh

This installs OrielOS to a 64 GB virtual disk and saves it in two formats in /var/lib/orielos/vm-disks:

  • orielos-<version>.qcow2 for QEMU, virt-manager and GNOME Boxes;
  • orielos-<version>.vmdk for VMware Workstation.

The files only take up the space that is in use: about 4 GB for the .qcow2 file, which is compressed, and about 8 GB for the .vmdk file. Useful options:

  • --formats qcow2 or --formats vmdk makes only one of them.
  • --size 128 makes a bigger disk (in GB).
  • --output DIR saves the disks somewhere else.
  • --serial-console shows the start-up messages on the virtual machine's serial port instead of the OrielOS splash screen. It is meant for testing and fault-finding.

Run tools/make-vm-disk.sh --help for all the options.

3a. Start it in QEMU

QEMU needs UEFI firmware with Secure Boot, as on a real PC. On Ubuntu and Debian it comes in the ovmf package; on Fedora, in edk2-ovmf, where the files are in /usr/share/edk2/ovmf/ and are called OVMF_CODE.secboot.fd and OVMF_VARS.secboot.fd.

First make a copy of the firmware's settings file for this virtual machine, then start it:

cp /usr/share/OVMF/OVMF_VARS_4M.ms.fd orielos-vars.fd
qemu-system-x86_64 -accel kvm -machine q35,smm=on -cpu host -m 6144 -smp 4 \
    -global driver=cfi.pflash01,property=secure,value=on \
    -drive if=pflash,format=raw,unit=0,file=/usr/share/OVMF/OVMF_CODE_4M.secboot.fd,readonly=on \
    -drive if=pflash,format=raw,unit=1,file=orielos-vars.fd \
    -drive file=/var/lib/orielos/vm-disks/orielos-dev.1.qcow2,format=qcow2,if=virtio \
    -device virtio-vga -display gtk \
    -audiodev pa,id=snd0 -device ich9-intel-hda -device hda-output,audiodev=snd0 \
    -netdev user,id=n0 -device virtio-net-pci,netdev=n0

Use your own disk's file name. The disk belongs to root, so either run QEMU with sudo or copy the disk to your home folder and take ownership of it first.

With virt-manager instead: choose Import existing disk image, pick the .qcow2 file and Fedora 44 as the operating system, give it 6 GB of memory and 4 processors, and tick Customise configuration before install. Under Overview, set Firmware to the UEFI firmware whose name ends in secboot.fd, then start it.

3b. Start it in VMware Workstation

On Windows with WSL2, tools/vmware-vm.sh sets the virtual machine up for you. VMware can only use files on the Windows drive, so give it a Windows folder:

tools/vmware-vm.sh create --vmdk /var/lib/orielos/vm-disks/orielos-dev.1.vmdk --dir 'C:\VMs'

It copies the disk to C:\VMs\orielos-dev.1 and creates a virtual machine there with UEFI and Secure Boot, 6 GB of memory, 4 processors, networking and sound. Open the .vmx file in that folder with VMware Workstation and press Power on this virtual machine.

To set it up by hand instead:

  1. Copy the .vmdk file to a folder on the Windows drive.
  2. In VMware Workstation, choose File > New Virtual Machine, then Custom, then I will install the operating system later.
  3. Choose Linux and Fedora 64-bit, and choose UEFI with Secure Boot when asked for the firmware type.
  4. Give it 4 processors and 6 GB of memory, and choose NAT networking.
  5. For the disk, choose NVMe, then Use an existing virtual disk, and pick the .vmdk file. If Workstation offers to convert the disk to a newer format, either answer works.
  6. Finish, then power on the virtual machine.

To check that Secure Boot is on, open the virtual machine's Settings > Options > Advanced. A virtual TPM is not needed.

What happens on first boot

The first start takes under a minute. Then the setup opens with a "Welcome to Plasma Desktop" page, over Plasma's own picture. Click Begin Setup, and it asks, one page at a time, for:

  1. your language;
  2. your keyboard layout;
  3. a network: a list of Wi-Fi networks if your PC has Wi-Fi, or otherwise whether its cable connection reaches the internet (a virtual machine is usually connected already);
  4. your time zone;
  5. when the computer goes to sleep and when the screen turns off, if you don't use it. It starts with sleep after 15 minutes and the screen off after 10;
  6. your name, a user name and a password. This account is an administrator.

When you click Finish, Plasma Setup creates your account and shows the login screen. Log in with the password you chose. Plasma Setup does not appear again on later starts.

Graphics in a virtual machine

OrielOS includes NVIDIA's driver, which only works with a real NVIDIA graphics card. In a virtual machine the desktop uses the virtual machine's basic graphics instead. Everything works, but animations can be slower and games will not run as they would on real hardware, so a virtual machine is for trying OrielOS out, not for judging gaming performance.

Removing the virtual machine

  • QEMU: delete the .qcow2 file and orielos-vars.fd.
  • VMware Workstation: right-click the virtual machine and choose Manage > Delete from Disk, or run tools/vmware-vm.sh delete --vmx 'C:\VMs\orielos-dev.1\orielos-dev.1.vmx'.
  • The disks made in step 2 stay in /var/lib/orielos/vm-disks until you delete them.

This guide is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Edit this guide on GitHub