How to start my VM with the new Sculpt-CE preview

March 7 2019 by Martin Stein

Things have changed a bit with the revised software deployment in the recently published preview of Sculpt CE. No matter wether you are updating from Sculpt VC and have installed your VM following the Sculpt-VC documentation or whether you downloaded a fresh Debian with the Sculpt-CE preview - this brief walk-through might help you getting it to run (again). Of course, once Sculpt CE gets released, the added documentation will explain things way more comprehensive.

Until then, the following approach - using the themed window manager - might be the easiest way to get along:

1. After Sculpt came up, connect to the network on the left-hand panel. This is needed to install software.

2. In the + menu in the middle, go to "Depot... -> genodelabs -> GUI...", select the "themed wm", and install it. Wait until the download at the left side is finished.

3. In the menu in the middle a routing dialog for the themed WM pops up. Use it to connect the themed WM as follows

   • GUI (focus) -> keyboard focus

   • GUI -> system GUI server

   • Report -> system reports

   After now clicking "Add component", the component graph in the middle should show the themed WM running.

4. For a quick test that the themed WM is running properly, you may start "Depot... -> genodelabs -> Demos... -> nano3d" with the following connection:

   • GUI -> themed wm

   You should now see a spinning 3D shape in a window. After switching to the runtime view by pressing F12, you should be able to move the window around. Switch back to the Leitzentrale view using again the F12 key.

5. Start the vm_fs component by clicking on the corresponding launcher at the top level of the + menu. This is a chroot instance that provides the VM directory (<sculpt-partition>/vm/debian) as a file system.

6. Start the shared_fs component analogously to the VM FS. This chroot instance provides the shared directory (<sculpt-partition>/shared/) as a file system.

7. Start the usb_devices_rom component from the + menu, which can be used to assign USB devices to the VM.

8. Now you can add the VM by selecting "Depot... -> genodelabs -> Virtual machines... -> vbox5-nova-sculpt". Again, a routing dialog pops up. Use it to connect the VM as follows:

   • File system (vm) -> vm fs

   • File system (shared) -> shared fs

   • GUI -> themed wm

   • Network -> nic router

   • ROM (capslock) -> global capslock state

   • ROM (platform info) -> platform information

   • ROM (usb devices) -> usb devices rom

   • Report (shape) -> themed wm

   • Report -> system reports

   • Region maps -> custom virtual memory objects

   • Real-time clock -> system clock

   • USB -> direct USB device access

Now the familiar virtual-machine window should come up in the runtime view.

Thanks to Norman Feske for writing the prototype of this article as part of a mail discussion!