Some observations after a couple of days experimenting with installing different Linux versions under VMware Fusion in Mac OS 10.5.2:

* So far, I’ve had the best success with Fedora Core 8 (version 9 is only a few days away), and Ubuntu 8.04. If you prefer the KDE desktop, Kubuntu also works well; they have a version with the still-beta KDE 4, but it’s not quite ready for prime time.

* With both Fedora and Ubuntu the 64-bit versions installed without errors, but were unstable; for example, the 64-bit version of Fedora 8 wouldn’t let me log out or shut down. I have a new Mac Pro with dual quad-core Xeon processors, so it should have been compatible with the 64-bit versions; but there you have it.

* When installing the OS with VMware Fusion, it’s a good idea to choose the “install later” option after the initial setup, then use the “Settings” option to increase the RAM allocation for that virtual machine before opening it again. You can’t increase the RAM while the VM is running, and the installation process goes faster if you give it more RAM.

* I may be weird, but I gots to has my emacs text editor. I’d rather be waterboarded than use vim. After installing the latest emacs with the “Add/Remove Programs” package manager, the first thing you’ll want to do is create a file in your home directory named ‘.emacs’ with the following line, to disable that annoying startup screen:

(setq inhibit-startup-message t)

* Yes, I know this is a very geeky post.