Re: Move VM to another folder location
Posted: 3. Jan 2015, 17:48
Ok so here is a little more insight to what I have going, what I have done so far and what I am still trying to accomplish.
The reason for wanting to set up one VM for five users to access is to allow an environment where the kids can access one version of Windows, with one copy of MS Office 365 installed for use on their school projects. I am managing the security of MS Office and files access within Windows with 5 separate user accounts, 3 for the kids and 2 admin accounts for the parents.
The purpose of using MS Office for Windows, rather than MS Office for Mac or some of the free or cheaper alternatives (I have both on different machines), is because of the nature of the school system and the projects the kids are working on. Our school system is 100% Mac, as are 99% of the classmates my kids have who they have to collaborate on projects with. Introducing another version of Office, even one for Mac rather than Windows, carries enough inconsistencies between formatting (especially with Power Point), that it makes finishing projects for the kids extremely difficult and collaboration almost impossible. They spend most of their time worrying about, and trying to redo, formatting inconsistencies that they never have the opportunity to focus on the real work.
After socratis suggested that I install this on a separate HDD, ignoring volume permissions, I decided to set up one separate partition on my Mac HDD (ChipMcK is correct that I have a 1 Terabyte HDD so space is not currently an issue) and installed the VM there. I originally set out to create a shared partition on a Drobo FS that I have on my network but quickly realized that speed would be an issue since I am running wireless on my iMac rather than wired.
I have currently gotten the VM installed on the new partition and have configured Windows with all user accounts and permissions including a fully operational version of MS Office 365. The last hurdle I had to clear was an issue with ending the VM in such a way that would require each user, in their own session, to log in to Windows under their unique user account (to keep permissions and security in place). Through a post made in another thread I started I received a suggestion to shut down Windows when ending the VM rather than saving the current state. I had to address some issues I had with a corrupt image of Windows first (I was getting error messages every time I launched a new session), but now that I have resolved this final issue I believe all is well.
The only thing I still have to do is get the VM assigned to all user accounts here on my iMac, run some thorough tests, and I think I will be finished. I have set this up in one of the other user accounts and the only problem I am having is getting the Alias that I created of the VM to launch from the desktop. I believe this is a setting issue on the iMac rather than something associated with the VM.
As a side note, loukingjr posted in one of my other threads yesterday suggesting that I should have concatenated all of my threads into one post rather than three. Seeing the questions and feedback here I think he was right and would have probably made this thread a little more clear for everyone. I participate in several other forums where users only like to answer one specific question at a time and not several, continuously added questions in the same thread. Hopefully adding in this additional detail helps to clear up where this project stands and I will heed loukingjr's advice if I have to open addition threads in the future.
The reason for wanting to set up one VM for five users to access is to allow an environment where the kids can access one version of Windows, with one copy of MS Office 365 installed for use on their school projects. I am managing the security of MS Office and files access within Windows with 5 separate user accounts, 3 for the kids and 2 admin accounts for the parents.
The purpose of using MS Office for Windows, rather than MS Office for Mac or some of the free or cheaper alternatives (I have both on different machines), is because of the nature of the school system and the projects the kids are working on. Our school system is 100% Mac, as are 99% of the classmates my kids have who they have to collaborate on projects with. Introducing another version of Office, even one for Mac rather than Windows, carries enough inconsistencies between formatting (especially with Power Point), that it makes finishing projects for the kids extremely difficult and collaboration almost impossible. They spend most of their time worrying about, and trying to redo, formatting inconsistencies that they never have the opportunity to focus on the real work.
After socratis suggested that I install this on a separate HDD, ignoring volume permissions, I decided to set up one separate partition on my Mac HDD (ChipMcK is correct that I have a 1 Terabyte HDD so space is not currently an issue) and installed the VM there. I originally set out to create a shared partition on a Drobo FS that I have on my network but quickly realized that speed would be an issue since I am running wireless on my iMac rather than wired.
I have currently gotten the VM installed on the new partition and have configured Windows with all user accounts and permissions including a fully operational version of MS Office 365. The last hurdle I had to clear was an issue with ending the VM in such a way that would require each user, in their own session, to log in to Windows under their unique user account (to keep permissions and security in place). Through a post made in another thread I started I received a suggestion to shut down Windows when ending the VM rather than saving the current state. I had to address some issues I had with a corrupt image of Windows first (I was getting error messages every time I launched a new session), but now that I have resolved this final issue I believe all is well.
The only thing I still have to do is get the VM assigned to all user accounts here on my iMac, run some thorough tests, and I think I will be finished. I have set this up in one of the other user accounts and the only problem I am having is getting the Alias that I created of the VM to launch from the desktop. I believe this is a setting issue on the iMac rather than something associated with the VM.
As a side note, loukingjr posted in one of my other threads yesterday suggesting that I should have concatenated all of my threads into one post rather than three. Seeing the questions and feedback here I think he was right and would have probably made this thread a little more clear for everyone. I participate in several other forums where users only like to answer one specific question at a time and not several, continuously added questions in the same thread. Hopefully adding in this additional detail helps to clear up where this project stands and I will heed loukingjr's advice if I have to open addition threads in the future.
