Getting Started
Now that you’ve learned about the benefits of deploying software as a virtual appliance, try it out and experience the benefits firsthand.
Set up a virtualized environment
Your virtual appliance will run in a virtualized environment. With VMware, this step is easy—and free. If you don’t already have a VMware virtualization solution installed, download either VMware Player or VMware Server for free to get your virtualization environment up and running in minutes.
Find and download a virtual appliance
Once you have set up your virtualized environment, find a virtual appliance that is interesting to you. Browse the VMware Virtual Appliance Marketplace which has over 700 virtual appliances to get started.
After you select the virtual appliance you want to try, click on the appropriate download link (‘Try’ or ‘Buy’ for VMware Certified Virtual Appliances or ‘Download’ for all other virtual appliances) and go to the host site to begin the download process. Typically this will involve downloading a ZIP file.
Install your virtual appliance
Installing your virtual appliance is simple. You can review this tutorial to see a sample of this easy to follow deployment process, which typically follows the steps below:
- Unzip the ZIP file to create the directory for your virtual appliance
- Review the Read Me or Getting Started file in that directory - Note the default user name and password, plus any other pointers about configuring your appliance during its first boot
- Double-click the virtual machine settings file, *.vmx, to boot your virtual appliance
- Follow the directions on screen during the initial boot – typically this involves entering some information, agreeing to the EULA, changing the default password, and navigating to the web interface to complete the configuration
Your virtual appliance is ready for you to use. Whether it is a new Blog server or a Wiki server or some other fancy Web 2.0 application, you never need to run through anything more complicated than a basic configuration wizard to get the entire solution up an running!
