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VPC 6.1 and OS X networking together on a PowerBook G4 Network
Discovery through adversity once again. After applying the AirPort 3.2 update on my Powerbook G4 1GHz (sans-AirPort extreme), I discovered Virtual PC 6.1 with virtual switch (DHCP) could no longer "see" Mac OS X and vice-versa, both on the AirPort interface logged into an AirPort network. This lead to desperate experimentation that panned out.

Caveat: no testing beyond my experience of AirPort 3.2 update / Panther / VPC 6.1. AirPort card and built-in Ethernet required. Mileage probably will vary.

Situation: I deploy struts apps into Tomcat under OS X that utilizes JDBC to a SQL Server, as well as a socket-based Java interface to a Business Intelligence server, both running under VPC 6.1.

Here's how to get this to work with no Ethernet cable attached to the built-in Ethernet interface and having not joined any AirPort network (although AirPort interface must be on). It doesn't get more isolated than that in a car traveling down the interstate!
  1. Under System Preferences, set up Sharing to share "AirPort" internet connection to "Built-in Ethernet." Apparently OS X will allow this, even though the built-in Ethernet interface is inactive. A check with ifconfig will confirm what's happening with regards to Panther's DHCP server. Even more amazing is that VPC will use it.

  2. Ensure Virtual PC virtual switch is pointing to "built-in Ethernet" and crank up (for me, XP Pro) with DHCP under Windows.
That's it. After that, OS X can ping the VPC instance at the DHCP address assigned to it via internet sharing. VPC can ping the OS X AirPort IP address (for me, a fixed IP unrelated to any active AirPort network in the car). The apps communicate brilliantly between one another - no wires/routers/hubs necessary. Quite fast, too!

I hope this hint helps some folks - it certainly helped me!
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VPC 6.1 and OS X networking together on a PowerBook G4
Authored by: forthy on Nov 07, '03 02:04:24PM

Great! This is the hint I waited for since I use VPC!

I have some VPCs with Linux and *BSD running. They represent the installations at my customers. It's a great tool for testing changes before they're put into the production environment.

Regards, Stephan

---
Tu nix ohne Unix



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VPC 6.1 and OS X networking together on a PowerBook G4
Authored by: inertia186 on Nov 08, '03 01:52:10PM

Well, it certainly seems to work while I'm on my Airport network connected to my Linksys router. Internet Sharing is happy to share the route over the Airport.

But what happens when there is no internet connection? Internet Sharing won't start share when there's nothing to share.

In other words, have you actually tried it on the interstate?



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VPC 6.1 and OS X networking together on a PowerBook G4
Authored by: kdkinsey on Nov 08, '03 02:30:30PM

6 hours up the interstate, in fact (New Orleans to Atlanta). In Panther, internet sharing will apparently share an interface, regardless of whether or not an active connection exists. Turning the airport (interface) off will disable sharing of that interface. The fact a network is present or not seems to have no affect.

I found this curious, but advantageous. 'ifconfig' in the terminal will confirm this. To be on the safe side, I did assign the airport interface a static address even though there was no network present (192.168.1.2, gateway: 192.168.1.1) so Apache/Tomcat would have something to hold on to, although linkback(localhost) should have worked just as well.

After some additional experimentation, I have noticed that the reverse of what I describe does not work with VPC. If the Internet Sharing is setup such that the DHCP server is bound to the airport interface (share internet connection from built-in ethernet to airport), VPC will not see the DHCP server and will not get assigned an address. It works fine as described in the original post. It appears NAT works differently between the airport and built-in ethernet interfaces.

I haven't done much testing, but it also appears that after applying the latest airport update (3.2), VPC virtual switch isn't working quite right when pointed at the airport interface. Pointed at the built-in interface is okay. I haven't used the default option, so can't say much about that one.

K



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VPC 6.1 and OS X networking together on a PowerBook G4
Authored by: picovhints on Nov 11, '03 12:02:04PM

Don't work for me.
When I start VPC 6.1 under 10.3.1 I got the message "virtual switch networking could not be started" and it will be disabled (the message also say the permission for virtual switch support are set correctly).
I've a PowerBook G4 1GHz with AirPort card (not extreme).
I've tried to disable airport, to connect/disconnect the ethernet cable ecc... but the problem don't disappear (even reinstalling VPC from scratch).

I know some other users got this networking error but other user don't: anyone can help me to make virtual switch working?

I need to reach the TCP services into the guest OS from the Mac for developement purpose.

The hint http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20030911124758992 works in an half way: I can see the Mac TCP services into VPC but I need also the opposite.

Thanks to all.



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VPC 6.1 and OS X networking together on a PowerBook G4
Authored by: elgato on May 24, '04 01:49:47AM
To allow a communication on both sides "Mac OS X" & "Virtual PC", I did the following and it worked perfectly, I have a DSL connection and I had to switch the Network location everytime I wanted to connect to VPC or internet. First check if there is any entry for the ethernet/port
 en0 
by typing in the Terminal window:
 ifconfig -a 
it should be in the begining of the line "en0:", in my case I had no entry for "en0". Type the command:
 sudo /sbin/ifconfig en0 alias 192.168.1.2 
to remove:
 sudo /sbin/ifconfig en0 -alias 192.168.1.2 

You can put of course any IP address. ;-)

On VPC I have Windows installed and have set the Network TCP/IP settings as follows (Fixed IP Address):
IP Address: 192.168.1.4
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
Gateway: 192.168.1.2 (I'm not sure if it makes any difference, but I entered the Mac IP Address as mentioned above).

On Virtual PC, you have to set the Networking preferences of the Virtual Machine to "Virtual Switch".

You should be able to communicate on both ways. I have installed a server application on VPC and it worked fine. From the PC I was able to connect to my local Apache Web server.

Additional tip, you can also communicate with a second computer that way. I have a mini network with 2 computers connected via ethernet. The second computer has the address 192.168.1.5. This tip allows me to surf on my Mac via my standard internet connection and connect at the same time on my 2nd PC (not connected to the internet) and to VirtualPC.

I hope this will help some of you.
Best regards



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VPC 6.1 and OS X networking together on a PowerBook G4
Authored by: lilgto64 on Jun 27, '04 06:11:08PM
Interesting. And works - fast networking between guet and host OS but muxh slower networking from guest to outside world using the share built-in ethernet when AIrport is the only live connection.
Alsol interesting and perhaps where some have gotten into trouble is that (for me at least) when I shared my Airport connection over the built-in ethenet, the default gateway of the guest OS and the IP address of the guest OS where 192.168.2.x rather than 192.168.1.x.
While this works well enough to IP between guest and host - it adds an additioanl bridging layer between the guest OS and the "real" network outside the system.
On the plus side for most folks they may only predominately need one or the other and not both and it seems that you can change the VPC network prefs at the application level (from Airport to Built-in) while you have a guest OS is a saved state without having to discard that saved state and reboot the guest OS (as you would have to do if you disable or enable networking in the guest settings with a saved state).

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VPC 6.1 and OS X networking together on a PowerBook G4
Authored by: h3nrch on Jul 17, '04 01:11:35PM

For what it's worth, I tried exactly what you suggested and it seems to allow communication between the guest OS and the host. However, I wanted to run Windows Update to grab some critical fixes and it would just hang. I tried tracerouting from the guest to the internet successfully, but web browsing failed. Then I decided to turn off the Panther firewall on the host, and suddenly I was able to browse and run Windows Update from the guest. Obviously, it isn't ideal to run without the firewall, but if you're on a private WLAN it might be ok for you. The firewall issue needs more research to make it a successful hint.



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