Category: Virtualization

Installing USB Wireless Card On Kali Linux VMware

So I ran into this problem, I installed a fresh copy of Kali Linux onto a VM (VMware) so I could do some pen-testing on my local network without booting into Linux but couldn’t get Kali to use my external wireless card (I needed packet injection capabilities ;))

To make this short and sweet all you have to do to use your external USB wireless card (In My Case an Alfa Card) is just install updated vmware tools (I am assuming you have already added USB Controller in your VM settings…) you can do this by using the following commands on your shell/terminal:

apt-get update
apt-get install open-vm-tools

Once installed you should see your wireless card detecting new networks. This worked on Kali Linux x64 and because its based on Ubuntu Its safe to assume it will work with Ubuntu. Good luck and good hunting ;)

Virtualization Vs Physical Networks

Ok so in the next couple of weeks we will be undergoing projects that will lead us into the world of virtual environments, Virtual environments allow you utilize your hardware resources much more effectively allowing you to consolidate on hardware/server and power costs with out sacrificing funds to do it. In fact VMware offers their ESXi version free for IT professional to try. With the release of Windows Server 2008 Microsoft began to pay more attention to the world of virtualization with the introduction of MS Hypervisor (Their Version of Virtualization).
I have worked with both in the past and although Microsofts Hypervisor did not disappoint in performance it lacked in compatability, unlike its competitor VMware. VMware is definately the choice of the pro’s as it offers more in compatability allowing you to run both windows and linux/UNIX networks or if your soul desires an integration of both Linux and Window’s networks.
Scalability is no issue when running virtual networks as you can scale your resources on demand. Once these virtual networks reach a certain maturity they become Clouds, Clouds are  large virtual networks. Clouds have the ability to adjust environment resources on demand, leaving you the ability to control your resources on a much more detailed and intelligent level. Redundancy in virtualization is not a problem as VMware provides awesome tools that allows on demand restoration minimizing service downtime. So to make things short VMware is ahead in the game of virtualization so we are going to use VMware to build our first small cloud that will house our Mail, Database, Web, Dev and CRM server. I will use all open source software in my tutorials, I believe the world is better off sharing knowledge then it is from restricting access to it. In the end we will have saved thousands of dollars on power and software costs it will be cheaper to run your business because you wont need a server for every application type, only one running virtual environments that will perform just as good or better.