virtual_box

This gem is a Ruby API for VirtualBox, Sun's open-source virtualization software that supports Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows.

Usage

virtual_box is mainly intended to help out with testing. The snippet below shows a complete setup / teardown scenario.

setup do
    vdi_file = '/tmp/disk.vdi'
    @disk = VirtualBox::Vm::Disk.create :file => vdi_file,
                                        :size => 16 * 1024 * 1024
  iso_file = 'test/fixtures/tinycore/remix.iso'
  @net = VirtualBox::Net.new(:ip => '192.168.66.6', :netmask => '255.255.255.0',
                             :dhcp => { :start_ip => '192.168.66.66' }).add

  @vm = VirtualBox::Vm.new(
      :board => { :ram => 256, :video_ram => 16, :os => :linux26 },
      :io_buses => [{ :bus => :ide,
                      :disks => [{ :file => iso_file, :port => 1 }] },
                    { :bus => :sata, :disks => [@disk] }],
      :nics => [{ :mode => :host, :chip => :virtual,
                  :net_name => @net.name }]).register
end

teardown do
  @vm.unregister
  @net.remove
  @disk.drop
end

Features

Currently, the gem supports the following features:

VM creation and removal
VM start, and stop
Disk (VDI, VMDK, VHD) and DVD (ISO) images
NAT, bridged, host-only and internal networking
DHCP configuration for host-only and internal networks
VirtualBox version detection (OSE vs. regular)

Dependencies

The gem uses the VirtualBox CLI (command-line tools), so they must be installed and on the system's path. The gem is developed against the documentation for VirtualBox 4.

Development Dependencies

Running tests relies on a few command-line tools.

On Fedora, use the following command to install the packages.

sudo yum install -y advancecomp curl mkisofs p7zip p7zip-plugins squashfs-tools

On OSX, run the following command.

brew install advancecomp cdrtools curl p7zip squashfs

Limitations

This gem makes some simplifying assumptions (rails people would say it is opinionated).

VM configuration XML file management is completely delegated to VirtualBox; the gem assumes and enforces the invariant that all XML files map to registered VMs

Contributing to virtual_box

Check out the latest master to make sure the feature hasn't been implemented or the bug hasn't been fixed yet.
Check out the issue tracker to make sure someone already hasn't requested it and/or contributed it.
Fork the project.
Start a feature/bugfix branch.
Commit and push until you are happy with your contribution.
Make sure to add tests for it. This is important so I don't break it in a future version unintentionally.
Please do not mess with the Rakefile, version, or history.