How And Why I Use Oracle VM VirtualBox

One of the challenges that I face at my job is supporting multiple clients that use different versions of Siebel Clinical (CTMS). Not only are they different versions, but each instance has been uniquely configured and enhanced.

With many clients to support, plus internal product development efforts, I needed to find a way to run Siebel Tools quickly using a dedicated web client, VPN, etc., for each specific configuration.

The solution that I settled on is Oracle VM VirtualBox. It’s free, it’s incredibly reliable, and it runs on a variety of host systems, including OS X.

Here is a screenshot of what it looks like (FYI, ASCEND is a pre-configured and enhanced version of Siebel CTMS that we offer):

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In this screenshot, you will notice three virtual machines are available. These represent the three projects that I am currently working on. Since I usually allocate about 100GB for each virtual machine, I don’t keep all 10 virtual machines available. Other projects (e.g., clients that are not in active development) are moved to an external hard drive and re-imported as needed. Each individual virtual machine is stored as a single file, so it is very easy to back up or move each VM from one host computer to another.

Here is a screenshot showing one of the virtual machines running:

One of neat features is that this setup allows me to quickly create a new virtual machine to support a new client using the clone feature:

And finally, here is what the venerable Siebel Tools looks like running on a Mac:

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