virtualbox.org

First off, I have been away from Networking and Linux for quite a few years so if I seem to be somewhat ignorant, please forgive me. The whole RE-reading EVERYTHING has me somewhat on the concerned side.

My goal - I would like to run a current version of Linux so that I can host a very old version of Slackware. The reason: I built this version of slackware over 10 years ago and IF and only IF (IFF) I can get this to work, I can change out the data within the database, rebuild the database, and then run as a virtual OS. However, the problem appears to be that the hardware has changed so dramatically that I am not sure if this is going to create a problem. I would be lucky, at best, to find a computer capable of running the old Slackware. One primary reason is that the video appears to be completely different. framebuffers, virtual frame buffers? yea gonna be some reading there for sure.

How likely is it that I will have to get a "current" copy of Slackware - RE-read all of the documentation, strip everything out, and start from scratch all over again?

What document will provide a (heh with linux right) basic overview of how this virutal box works so that I can figure out where to begin with this?

I think this should be moved to "Linux Guests".

I'm not sure what you're asking. Are you asking if you can image an old Slackware Linux drive and run as a VM? Quite probably. If not, I see there's still a Slackware website.

If you don't make it too complicated for yourself then there isn't much to understand with VirtualBox: it gives you a second PC (and more) to install an OS on. Thats it. The only unusual feature is that all the hardware in that second PC - except the CPU - is simulated. Just remember to think of it as a separate PC with its own hardware. It isn't a clone of your first PC, so the hardware on your first PC is mostly not relevant (i.e. your second PC doesn't have SATA controller and fancy GPU or wireless comms just because your main one does). The only relevance of your host PC hardware is that your guest probably won't be able to have capabilities that your host doesn't have the resources to emulate: you can't have 2GB RAM on a host with 512MB, you can't have an external network connection unless the host has one, etc.