Fedora can be easily installed on virtualbox if you want to try it out without doing a real install to your hard drive. In this tutorial we are going to do that. Since we shall be using 64bit fedora, virtualbox would need to have the VT-x/AMD-V virtualisation feature in bios. These are the virtualisation extension of the underlying CPU hardware. Installing the extension Pack for VirtualBox on Windows, Mac OS, and Ubuntu Linux Step 1: Locate the downloaded file, and it will come with the extension “.vbox-extpack ”. Double click on the file. To Setup Virtual Lab Fedora for Penetration testing. You need Winodw (any Version).
What Is Linux?
Linux is an operating system that is best known for being an open-source OS. This means that the platform is free to use, distribute, and even modify. Although the software is not popular amongst common end-users, it is highly regarded in the tech industry. Mostly, among developers, experts, and individuals that have a background in software technology. The main advantages of Linux are that it can provide optimum processing capability to support business, web servers, and data centers that run today. It is stable, flexible, high performing, more secured, and generally compatible with the hardware that powers our computing tasks.
Despite the popularity of the Windows OS for their user interfaces, Linux undoubtedly provides a more superior environment in more areas than you can imagine.
What Is Red Hat Linux Fedora?
Since Linux is an open-source operating system, this paved the way for more developers to create and branch out for their version. This does not necessarily come as a bad thing. In fact, with such opportunities, new Linux-based operating systems called Linux distros have been invented for open use. Among these is the Fedora Operating System. Fedora is a Linux-based OS that is now sponsored by Red Hat Enterprise.
![]()
Fedora is a popular Linux operating system that is often compared with Ubuntu or Linux Mint. It is garnered for becoming a solid OS with broad software application availability, rapid yet significant updates, and new exciting features. It is one of those that strongly holds a free and open-source philosophy by actively refusing proprietary programs that do not match their view. This move has earned huge respect among its consumer base.
What Is A VirtualBox?
A VirtualBox is a software that is published by Oracle that allows you to run your operating systems on top of one. It creates a virtual machine that can better preserve an environment without having to acquire another computer hardware. To paint this in a more digestible form, you can visualize a VirtualBox as a new desktop with its operating system. Normally, end users would get a computer with a built-in OS like Windows or MacOS. If you want to change the OS, you would typically buy a new computer.
In this case, a VirtualBox is similar to that of a new desktop computer. You can create a Virtual Machine with another OS and run it on top of your computer’s OS. You may ask, why would you even do such a thing?
Isolated Working Environments
With a VirtualBox, you can run operating systems in the same machine while isolating the other. Desktop working environments can be extremely different, and it will not affect the other. This is beneficial when you need to test specific scenarios that can only work on a certain architecture, without compromising your setup.
Back-up and Availability
A VirtualBox lets you secure a reliable back-up environment when those dreadful OS crash or wipe out arise. It preserves the state of your environment which can easily be accessed, similarly as you would before. When recovering from an OS failure, VirtualBox can appear as an immediate working environment already. It reduces the hassle of reinstalling all the applications and reconfiguring them according to your needs.
Application Requirements
There are a few things to establish when you have decided to install Fedora in a VirtualBox. The first is to install a VirtualBox from Oracle and a Fedora Operating System. Both systems come free as they are open-source software applications. It is best to acquire them from their official sites to avoid the risk of a faulty version.
Get VirtualBox:
Step 1
You would first need to install a VirtualBox, which can be downloaded from https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads
VirtualBox is free software that can easily be acquired.
Step 2
When downloading the VirtualBox, you can choose the latest platform package that would fit your OS needs (Windows, Mac, Linux)
Step 3
Install the VirtualBox and once it is finished, you should be able to see the configuration and management dashboard for the Oracle VM VirtualBox Manager.
Get Fedora OS:
Step 1
To be able to install Fedora inside the VirtualBox, you would need to download the OS which you can get from
https://getfedora.org/
Step 2
Once downloaded, the iso file should be available.
Creating the Virtual Machine
Now, we can begin the setup:
Step 1: From the Oracle VM VirtualBox Manager, you can start with creating an empty Virtual Machine (VM)
Step 2: An installation guide should appear to set up the following:
Step 3: Once the newly created Virtual Machine is established, you can start tweaking the configuration in terms of:
Step 4: When you are happy with the setup, you can proceed with OS installation of your liking
Step 5: Choose the “Start” option from your Oracle VM VirtualBox Manager
Installing Fedora in the VirtualBox
When you boot-up your Virtual Machine, you can think of it as running a separate desktop computer and consider how an OS is usually installed from a new hardware machine.
Step 1: As soon as you start the Virtual Machine, you should see the start-up disk which you can choose to select the downloaded Fedora ISO
Step 2: Choose to install from the Hard Drive and a setup wizard should appear as a guide
Step 3: The Fedora Installation wizard should be able to guide you in the following:
Step 4: The installation progress bar should appear which you will just have to wait to finish. It may take a while, but it should reach completion.
Step 5: Once the installation is complete, you can restart your Virtual Machine and you should be able to seamlessly access the environment as you would in a separate Fedora Linux Computer.
Installing Fedora 28 would offer a lot of old-school Debian users a change of environment. Fedora’s 6 monthly release cycle strives to keep up with the latest pieces of the entire software stack from the Linux kernel all the way up to the desktop environment.
Installing Fedora in a VM is a great way to get your feet wet when it comes to the whole Red Hat ethos. That said, we will be using VirtualBox 5.2.12 which is the latest version of VirtualBox available at the time of this writing. So let’s get started.
Step 1: Creating a VM and Allocating resources
Virtual Machine is an abstraction created to lie to a guest operating system that it is running on hardware, only its “Virtual Hardware” or a Virtual Machine. The guest operating system would then treat this VM as if it were regular hardware (to a fair degree of accuracy). But first we need to create the virtual hardware.
In VirtualBox, in the upper left corner find an Icon which says “New”. This will open up a Virtual Machine setup wizard which will walk us through the process.
Set the memory to at least 2GB (2048 MB) for a smooth experience, as shown below.
Click on “Create” to move on to creating a virtual hard disk for your VM.
Select the size for your virtual hard disk along with the format. We recommend at least 10GB of space, as per Fedora’s official minimum requirements, and .vdi format which works the best with VirtualBox.
Click on “Create” and your Virtual Machine is ready for Fedora.
Step 2 (Optional): Tweaking your VM settingsHow To Download Fedora Virtualbox On Mac Windows 10
We will be making two tweaks to improve our experience with the VM a bit better. This includes:
To begin with, right-click on your newly created Fedora VM and select settings and go to Settings → System → Processor
And if you have a multicore processor dedicate 2 core to it. Stay inside the Green region and avoid the Red Shaded area otherwise your host won’t be as responsive or it might even crash!
Next, click on Network from the left column and select the kind of Networking Interface(s) you might want to add to it. For example, when launching a web server in a VM, a typical thing to do is to select Bridge Adapter which makes the VM a part of your LAN.
This means, in a typical home setup where you have a router (access point) to which your phone, computer and other devices are connected, your VM will be able to talk to these devices. So if you host a website in this VM, your mobile phone or any device connected to your home network can see this website.
On the other hand, the default NAT configuration allows your VM to only be able to talk to the host system and the host system offers internet connectivity for gettings updates, browsing, streaming, etc.
Step 3: Installing the Operating System
We will be installing Fedora 28 Workstation on this VM. To get your copy of the .iso file click here.
To start the VM, simply double-click on it from your VirtualBox GUI. Since there’s no operating system installed, the virtual hard disk is not bootable. VirtualBox notices that this is the first time we are booting the system so it prompts us to select a start-up disk.
Click on the file icon, and locate Fedora .iso, that you downloaded earlier, inside your file system. Once that is selected, click “Start”. Upon this you will be asked what is it that you want to do with this .iso. Since such live media devices are used not only for installation but for system recovery or rescue and troubleshooting.
But since we want to install the system we will select the top-most option which says “Start Fedora-Workstation-Live-28”. Use arrow keys to go toggle through the options and return key to select the required one.
Once the live media is booted, Fedora would help us easily install the operating system on our Virtual Disk. The welcome menu would automatically ask you for that, as shown below:
Select “Install to Hard Drive”. Select your language, we assume English (US , UK or any country of you live in) would be a good choice, since you are reading this.
Hopefully, Time and Date would be automatically selected at this point. If not, then click on “Time & Date” and select the appropriate option.
Once that is done, click on the “Installation Destination” so we can pick what device we are going to install Fedora on (in case, you have multiple storage devices attached to your system).
Let everything stay at its default value, and Fedora will handle the storage and partitioning for you. Unless you have a specific use case in your mind, in which case, feel free to experiment.
Click “Done”, on the top-left, once you have verified the destination (or configured it).
You will notice that the “Begin Installation” button, which was greyed out earlier, is now highlighted. Click on it and Fedora will start OS installation.
This will take a while but requires no further assistance or intervention until it finishes installing the OS and boot manager. After the installation is complete, we shutdown the system to remove the installation media.
To remove the installation media, simply right-click on the machine (In VirtualBox GUI), go to Settings → Storage
Select the Fedora-Workstation-Live, select the CD icon on the right-most side and Remove Disk from Virtual Drive.
Step 4: User Accounts and System Updates
Click OK, and start the system again. The boot menu will pop up, select Fedora and not the rescue option.
Now Fedora will greet you with a Welcome screen where it will ask you for permissions for collecting user data and crash reports, and if would you like to sign up using one of your many email or social media accounts. You can skip through these, if you like, and then you will come to the part where you set up a username and password.
![]()
After this Fedora is officially ready to be used as your personal workstation OS!
Update your system by opening up a terminal and running the following commands:
ConclusionHow To Download Fedora Virtualbox On Mac Virtualbox
That’s it! We have a fully update-to-date Fedora installation for you to experiment with and work at. Take a snapshot so you can restore it when things go wrong. Let us know what other things you want run on VirtualBox or if there’s a cool customization that you want us to make happen.
Comments are closed.
|
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. Archives
December 2020
Categories |