This post could also be called ‘an introduction to JumpBox’, as that’s essentially what it is. JumpBox allows you to install several open source applications, such as WordPress, in a virtual environment (like Parallels, VMWare and Xen). They provide the complete package - WordPress itself, all of its required components (database, runtime dependencies etc) and the virtual machine configuration files. Continue for the full tutorial/walkthrough..
Some thoughts up front - I’m not sure I’d want to use this method to host an actual public WordPress blog. With that said, this makes for a terrific development environment. You can use it to test WordPress plugins, themes, updates etc - without messing up your “actual” blog.
JumpBox is currently free (as a beta) and no registration is required, but according to their blog this will likely change. The price for JumpBox’s WordPress ’system’ is targeted at $29, which is very reasonable. Check their blog for more details.
This tutorial will use Parallels as the virtualization software. The steps are probably very similar for VMWare or Xen. Requirements: you’ll need Parallels, VMWare or Xen, 3GB Free disk space, and a minimum 1GB System RAM (the Virtual Machine uses 256MB)
Lets get started.
- Download the 130MB zip file from here. Yes, that’s a big download. For what it’s worth, it flew by for me at a rate of 790KBps. It actually took longer to unzip than it did to download
Unzip it when it has finished downloading. - Open the folder that was created when you unzipped the file, and double-click the JumpBox.pvs file.
- Parallels will launch. Click the Start Virutal Machine button (the green arrow). Disregard any ‘Unable to open default cdrom’ errors that may appear.
- Once the virtual machine has finished booting, you’ll be presented with a JumpBox landing page. On this page, look for the Management Page: URL. It will probably be something like http://192.168.0.10x:3000. Back in your actual Operating System, open your web browser and load the URL. Don’t forget the :3000 part at the end.
- Enter the required info on the JumpBox Configuration page.
- Wait while JumpBox configures everything. This shouldn’t take very long at all.
- Click on the link provided to access WordPress.
- Ta-da! Your WordPress blog is now up and running. Access the administrative part of WordPress (so you can post, install plugins etc) by selecting either the Login link in the top navigation bar, or the login link from the Meta section of WordPress. The user name you’ll need to enter is admin and the password is the one you specified in step 5.
- Have fun!
- When it comes time to shut down the virtual machine, use the Admin section of JumpBox (not to be confused with the admin section of WordPress itself).
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Ross, great tutorial. Glad you found JumpBox useful. That annoying CD-ROM error you pointed out will be gone in the latest release coming out shortly (RC3). Thanks again for the mention to your readers.
Sean
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