Using coLinux to provide a linux environment on windows PC in public computer labs

There are many requests from teachers to computer lab management staff in universities. The most annoying one is that both the Windows and Linux environment are required. To satisfy such a request, a dual-boot system is widely used. But on a dual-boot system, students must wait for minutes to switch between Windows and Linux. And management staff has to repeat the boot and shutdown process to apply patches to both operating systems. To provide both operating systems' environment simultaneously, we have decided to use coLinux to run Linux as a Windows application, and installed it in our PC classroom. coLinux, Cooperative Linux, is an open-source, lightweight solution, as compared to full virtualization techniques such as VMware or Virtual PC. Cygwin could be another solution, but it has some restrictions against the full capability of Linux such as process management. coLinux enables both native Linux applications and Windows applications to run simultaneously on the screen. Our solution also avoids incompatibility problems that sometimes occur between Microsoft Office on Windows and Office suites on Linux.