Running Linux on Windows Hyper-V

Last week we had a very urgent requirement to getting 5 RHEL box to test some unusual scenario. In cirical tiomes building 5 different box and then have our required pieces of software on them was not easy.

I used this opportunity to use Windows Hyper-V and system centre manager for virtual machines. We setup a box with RHEL and put all required components on it. Then I converted the system to a template.

I knew this scenario was not supported in Hyper-V but wanted to take a chance. and Yes! I was able to get new machines out of that template. Definitely, we had to run a predefined script to change the host name etc, but we were able to get the things done within time frame and proceed.

Again mentioning that using RHEL on Hyper-V and them further using them in self service portal is not supported; but it really works and we used in a Test environment. BTW, there were lot of background work done in SCVMM earlier and that saved our critical time.