Re: [PLUG] Why isn't vmware free anymore?

[JP Vossen <jp@jpsdomain.org>]

> Date: Thu, 23 Aug 2007 10:59:01 -0400
> From: Michael Schultheiss <schultmc@cinlug.org>
> Subject: Re: [PLUG] Why isn't vmware free anymore?
>
> Marty Skitch wrote:
> >    Thanks for taking the time.  I can only assume that server is bare
> >    bones where as Workstation has all the bells and whistles.
>
> VMWare Server is the old VMWare GSX product rebranded afaik.

That's my understanding as well.

> I used Workstation in the past but now use Server exclusively.
>
> I'm not sure what benefit Workstation has over Server but Server works
> fine for me.

I use both VMware Workstation 5.5 and VMware Server 1.0.3 extensively. 
Workstation 6.0 just came out, but I haven't seen any compelling reason 
to upgrade yet (I also haven't looked into it much).  I find Player too 
limiting and don't both using it at all, since Server is free (as in 
beer, subject to license caveats as previously noted) and much better.

Here is my perspective.  Note VMware refers to the "host" machine that 
VMware is running on top of (except for ESX server, which runs on top of 
a stripped Linux but is not covered here) and "guest" machines which are 
the VMs (virtual machines) running inside of VMware itself.

Workstation:
* Not free as in beer
* Requires a GUI on the "host" machine
  + Does not allow a remote console (unless you VNC the host or something)
* Allows unlimited "snapshot" trees (think VM diffs), which is *really* 
great for all kinds of software/process testing

Server:
* Free as in beer (*.exe, *.rpm, *.tgz formats.  The *.tgz installs 
flawlessly on recent Debian and Ubuntu, but may require some/all of 
these packages: linux-image-686 linux-headers-686 build-essential xinetd 
autoconf2.13 automake1.9 automake
  + inetd is required for the console listener daemon
  + build-essential (and headers, make stuff) will be required to 
compile certain VMware modules if you upgrade your kernel to something 
newer than VMware has pre-compiled modules for.  They are really good 
about tracking Ubuntu, slightly less so about Debian, but sooner or 
later this *will* happen to you.  Not a big deal if everything you need 
is installed.)
* Does NOT require a GUI on the "host" machine!!!
  + I run VMware Server on very minimal Debian servers with no X
  + I also run Server on stock Ubuntu with X, see below
  + Requires a remote console (but if you have a GUI on the host 
machine you can connect to localhost)
* Only allows a single "snapshot" :-(

For my purposes, I wish that Server allowed snapshot trees or 
Workstation had a native remote (fat) console.  Either of those would be 
prefect for me.  But that's not how they work right now. :-/

One thing I've done with great success is install Ubuntu, with VMware 
*Server* on top, then run a W2K machine in that.  Ubuntu boots, auto 
logs in, fires up VMware Console, connects to the W2K machine 
full-screen, which auto logs in.  So after a reboot--eventually--my wife 
has her "W2K" machine sitting there, full screen.  It does audio, plays 
video (probably not well, but we don't do that much), etc.  But the 
entire thing is sitting on Ubuntu, so it's trivial to back it up, move 
it to another machine in care of hardware failure, etc.

Hope this is useful,
JP
----------------------------|:::======|-------------------------------
JP Vossen, CISSP            |:::======|        jp{at}jpsdomain{dot}org
My Account, My Opinions     |=========|      http://www.jpsdomain.org/
----------------------------|=========|-------------------------------
Microsoft has single-handedly nullified Moore's Law.
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has effectively flattened Moore's Law on hardware running Windows.
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