It's different and better because it moves the abstraction layer up a few notches.
First, Vagrant supports much more than just VirtualBox (maybe not a big deal if you only want to use VirtualBox).
Second, Vagrant comes with a nice configuration layer allowing you to specify what OS and VM options you want to use (maybe not a big deal if everyone in your group is already comfortable with the VirtualBox command line).
Third, it handles provisioning new VM's using the provisioner of your choice, like Chef, Puppet, regular old shell scripts, etc. (Maybe not a big deal if everyone in your group is already an expert at using the chosen tool e.g. knife).
Fourth, it wraps up all of the previous steps (plus a bunch more), so that people can just clone the current box and type 'vagrant up', and have a working copy of the production/staging/test/dev network. (Maybe not a big deal if everyone in your group is already an expert at setting up that network).
Anyway, I know that all comes off a bit glib, but Vagrant really shines in automating a bunch of not-necessarily difficult manual steps. I'm pretty sure it doesn't do anything that can't also be done through a variety of other mechanisms (being well-versed in the VirtualBox command line, for example), but so far, I've found it to be more pleasant to use than dealing with all those other mechanisms.
Comments
It's different and better because it moves the abstraction layer up a few notches.
First, Vagrant supports much more than just VirtualBox (maybe not a big deal if you only want to use VirtualBox).
Second, Vagrant comes with a nice configuration layer allowing you to specify what OS and VM options you want to use (maybe not a big deal if everyone in your group is already comfortable with the VirtualBox command line).
Third, it handles provisioning new VM's using the provisioner of your choice, like Chef, Puppet, regular old shell scripts, etc. (Maybe not a big deal if everyone in your group is already an expert at using the chosen tool e.g. knife).
Fourth, it wraps up all of the previous steps (plus a bunch more), so that people can just clone the current box and type 'vagrant up', and have a working copy of the production/staging/test/dev network. (Maybe not a big deal if everyone in your group is already an expert at setting up that network).
Anyway, I know that all comes off a bit glib, but Vagrant really shines in automating a bunch of not-necessarily difficult manual steps. I'm pretty sure it doesn't do anything that can't also be done through a variety of other mechanisms (being well-versed in the VirtualBox command line, for example), but so far, I've found it to be more pleasant to use than dealing with all those other mechanisms.