You can just run VBoxManage startvm "Sage-5.0"
from a script and it'll fire up that Virtual Machine. Are the lab computers really scrubbed without any permanent storage for the students? This seems rather user-unfriendly. I've broken too many flash drives ;-) You could run the gui user in the VM guest in a shared folder, and set up VirtualBox host to take the USB stick as the shared folder. But then you can't open the VM without the USB stick plugged, thats a pretty bad usability wart imho. We certainly can't make that the default in the VM that we offer on sagemath.org I'm currently looking into writing some small gui to set up the VM and set up shared folders / save worksheets but its not there yet. What would really be useful would be a plugin architecture for the notebook that allows one to add extra links to the sagenb pages and flask/python code as a backend. Then one could for example make an optional "cloud backup" spkg that would uploads everything to Google drive, say. On Wednesday, July 18, 2012 3:11:54 PM UTC-4, kcrisman wrote: > > Here's a question about the VirtualBox solution for Volker or others. > > How possible is the following lab scenario? > > 1. Student chooses a computer from a (nightly wiped) lab > 2. Student logs on to computer > 3. Student open a VirtualBox Sage that is already installed (on the > propagated image in the lab), which automatically starts Sage (no " power > on Sage-x.y.z by selecting it and clicking 'Start'." as on the > SageAppliance wiki page) > 4. Student puts in a flash drive, and easily surfs to their flash drive on > the "Upload" page of the server (because "enable shared folders" > instructions have been done ahead of time somehow) > 5. Student works on their worksheet > 6. Student downloads worksheet as sws, again to their flash drive > (currently I don't see a way to choose where to download them, they just do > to the default place) > 7. Student ejects zip drive > 8. Student leaves for dinner or checks FB or does whatever students do > nowadays > > In particular, I'm wondering whether > > * having Sage open as soon as one open the VirtualBox, not having to > choose it > * having the shared folder enabling done ahead of time, possibly > universally > * having the files be easy to find > > is possible. /media/sf_<volume name>/filename seems forbidding... > > Thanks, and my apologies if these questions are obvious from the > SageAppliance documentation or ask.sagemath answers; I felt like this was > subtly different, but maybe it's not. What I'm hoping is that a little lab > admin wizardry could make the VirtualBox solution nearly like having other > programs to double-click. Maybe there could even be a script that opened > the VirtualBox with Sage at exactly 9:55 for a 10:00 class... > > Thanks, > - kcrisman > -- To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/sage-support URL: http://www.sagemath.org
