Title here
Summary here
Lima
Introduction
Over the years, I’ve struggled with various operating systems and hardware. I’ve installed Ubuntu on old Mac laptops, only to have them fail due to motherboard issues. Fortunately, I managed to recover another laptop and reinstall Mac OS on it. I also tried Ubuntu on an HP laptop but eventually went back to Windows. I even bought a Framework laptop, but after struggling to get Ubuntu working properly, I decided to return it. I’ve experimented with Parallels, but it often crashes on my old Macs. Only thing that worked was using xfce on EC2 instances. But I wanted it to be fast - as if it was a local machine.
As a developer, finding a stable and efficient setup with Ubuntu has been a challenge. Virtual Box will not install on any of my Macs. Even VS Code crashes when connected to EC2 instances. Despite my best efforts, every approach I’ve tried so far has failed.
Lima Linux Machine
Lima is a tool that allows you to run Linux virtual machines (VMs) on macOS for development purposes. It provides a lightweight and efficient way to set up and manage Linux environments on your Mac.
In this article, we will create a Ubuntu virtual machine on M1 Mac mini (2020) Sonoma 14.1.1. It only has 8 GB memory. For quick experimentation purposes, this will work. Install Lima by following the instructions on its home page.
Prerequisite:
Install qemu on your Mac. I have:
qemu-system-x86_64 --version
QEMU emulator version 8.2.1
Copyright (c) 2003-2023 Fabrice Bellard and the QEMU Project developersUsing Lima
Here’s how you can use Lima for developing on a Mac:
limactl create ubuntulimactl shell ubuntuYou can now run commands from your machine that is executed on the VM:
bparanj@lima-ubuntu:/Users/bparanj/work$ lsb_release -aNo LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description: Ubuntu 23.10
Release: 23.10
Codename: manticbparanj@lima-ubuntu:/Users/bparanj/work$ timedatectl Local time: Tue 2024-03-19 10:14:47 EDT
Universal time: Tue 2024-03-19 14:14:47 UTC
RTC time: Tue 2024-03-19 14:14:48
Time zone: America/New_York (EDT, -0400)
System clock synchronized: yes
NTP service: active
RTC in local TZ: noSharing Folders
On my laptop, I am in this folder:
bparanj@lima-ubuntu:/Users/bparanj/work$ pwd
/Users/bparanj/workYou cannot create any folder from your anywhere on your machine:
bparanj@lima-ubuntu:/Users/bparanj$ mkdir ubuntu
mkdir: cannot create directory ‘ubuntu’: Read-only file systemYou have to be inside the .lima folder that Lima created:
$ pwd
/Users/bparanj/work
$ cd ..
$ cd .lima$ ll
total 0
drwxr-xr-x 5 bparanj staff 160 Feb 24 11:51 _config
drwx------ 22 bparanj staff 704 Feb 24 11:52 default
drwx------ 22 bparanj staff 704 Mar 19 10:13 ubuntuLet’s see file sharing in action between the Mac and Ubuntu VM:
$ cd ubuntu
$ pwd
/Users/bparanj/.lima/ubuntu
$ echo 'this is a test' > test.txtYou can access the shared directory on the host macOS at: /Users/your-username/.lima/vm-name/
View this file on VM:
bparanj@lima-ubuntu:/Users/bparanj/.lima/ubuntu$ ll
total 1975156
drwx------ 1 bparanj dialout 736 Mar 19 10:16 ./
drwx------ 1 bparanj dialout 160 Mar 19 10:12 ../
-rw-r--r-- 1 bparanj dialout 715849728 Feb 24 11:51 basedisk
-rw-r--r-- 1 bparanj dialout 257271808 Mar 19 10:12 cidata.iso
-rw-r--r-- 1 bparanj dialout 1049231360 Mar 19 10:17 diffdisk
srw------- 1 bparanj dialout 0 Mar 19 10:13 ga.sock=
-rw-r--r-- 1 bparanj dialout 6 Mar 19 10:12 ha.pid
srwxr-xr-x 1 bparanj dialout 0 Mar 19 10:12 ha.sock=
-rw-r--r-- 1 bparanj dialout 23726 Mar 19 10:13 ha.stderr.log
-rw-r--r-- 1 bparanj dialout 167 Mar 19 10:13 ha.stdout.log
-r--r--r-- 1 bparanj dialout 6 Mar 19 10:12 lima-version
-rw-r--r-- 1 bparanj dialout 23088 Mar 19 10:12 lima.yaml
-rw------- 1 bparanj dialout 6 Mar 19 10:12 qemu.pid
srwxr-xr-x 1 bparanj dialout 0 Mar 19 10:12 qmp.sock=
-rw-r--r-- 1 bparanj dialout 115024 Mar 19 10:13 serial.log
srwxr-xr-x 1 bparanj dialout 0 Mar 19 10:12 serial.sock=
-rw-r--r-- 1 bparanj dialout 0 Mar 19 10:12 serialp.log
srwxr-xr-x 1 bparanj dialout 0 Mar 19 10:12 serialp.sock=
-rw-r--r-- 1 bparanj dialout 543 Mar 19 10:13 serialv.log
srwxr-xr-x 1 bparanj dialout 0 Mar 19 10:12 serialv.sock=
-rw------- 1 bparanj dialout 725 Mar 19 10:12 ssh.config
srw------- 1 bparanj dialout 0 Mar 19 10:13 ssh.sock=
-rw-r--r-- 1 bparanj dialout 15 Mar 19 10:16 test.txtbparanj@lima-ubuntu:/Users/bparanj/.lima/ubuntu$ cat test.txt
this is a testI have two terminals open, the terminal with prompt bparanj@lima-ubuntu is the VM shell prompt and all commands are executed inside the VM. Another terminal has my Mac prompt. From this prompt I can run:
open .to view the files in Mac finder.
You will get an error if you execute that command inside the VM:
bparanj@lima-ubuntu:/Users/bparanj/.lima/ubuntu$ open .
Command 'open' not found, but can be installed with:
apt install mailcap # version 3.70+nmu1ubuntu1, or
apt install xdg-utils # version 1.1.3-4.1ubuntu3
Ask your administrator to install one of them.To stop the VM instance:
$ limactl stop ubuntuINFO[0000] Sending SIGINT to hostagent process 84926
INFO[0000] Waiting for the host agent and the driver processes to shut down
INFO[0000] [hostagent] Received SIGINT, shutting down the host agent
INFO[0000] [hostagent] Shutting down the host agent
INFO[0000] [hostagent] Stopping forwarding "/run/lima-guestagent.sock" (guest) to "/Users/bparanj/.lima/ubuntu/ga.sock" (host)
INFO[0000] [hostagent] Unmounting "/Users/bparanj"
INFO[0000] [hostagent] Unmounting "/tmp/lima"
INFO[0000] [hostagent] Shutting down QEMU with ACPI
INFO[0000] [hostagent] Sending QMP system_powerdown command
INFO[0004] [hostagent] QEMU has exited