[PLUG] VMware Workstation 8/9, Player 4/5 & Ubuntu 12.04 (& 12.10)

[JP Vossen <jp@jpsdomain.org>]

I was doing some research the other week which may be of some interest here.

First, I mostly use Ubuntu LTS releases, and it wasn't clear which 
VMware products worked on that.  The following Just Work (zero tweaking 
of any kind) on an old Dell Inspiron 1525 w/ 4G RAM running Ubuntu 12.04 
(x86_64) that I use as a test/host machine:

* VMware-Player-4.0.5-893925.x86_64.bundle    < Newly supports Ubuntu 12.04
	* https://www.vmware.com/support/player40/doc/releasenotes_player405.html

* VMware-Player-5.0.1-894247.x86_64.bundle
	* http://www.vmware.com/support/player50/doc/player-501-release-notes.html
		* Support for Ubuntu 12.10 as a host and guest

* VMware-Workstation-Full-8.0.5-893925.x86_64.bundle    < Newly supports 
Ubuntu 12.04
	* http://www.vmware.com/support/ws80/doc/releasenotes_workstation_805.html

* VMware-Workstation-Full-9.0.1-894247.x86_64.bundle
	* Read both:
	* http://www.vmware.com/support/ws90/doc/workstation-901-release-notes.html
		* Support for Ubuntu 12.10 as a host and guest
	* http://www.vmware.com/support/ws90/doc/workstation-90-release-notes.html


Note that with VMware-Player-5 they made the previously existing "free 
for *non-commercial* use only" status a lot more obvious (arguably 
intrusive, e.g. in the title bar).  OTOH, they do now offer commercial 
licenses for it, sort-of, via 
http://www.vmware.com/products/desktop_virtualization/fusion/professional.html.


Second, for me, VMware Workstation 9 is not worth upgrading to.  But 
there are some features that some of you probably do care about more 
than I do.

As far as I can see, the interface looks just like 8.x.  Otherwise, the 
features are:

* Windows 8 = don't care
* Graphics Improvements = mostly don't care
	* "...an improved Windows XP graphics driver..." = mostly don't care
* OpenGL for Linux Guests = nice-to-have
* Restricted Virtual Machines = don't care
* WSX = don't care
	* WSX is a prototype of a new VMware Workstation web interface that 
enables users to access their Shared virtual machines via a web browser 
on a tablet, smart phone or PC without installing any additional 
applications or browser plug-ins
* Downloading Virtual Machines from vSphere = don't care
* USB 3.0 = nice-to-have
* Nested Virtualization = mostly don't care
	* Can test ESXi inside WS...
* Hyper-V = don't care
* Virtual Performance Counters = don't care
	* VMware virtual processors now include the capability to enable 
virtual performance counters which will allow developers to run 
profiling applications, such as Intel's vTune, in a virtual machine.
* Remoting Improvements = nice-to-have
	* The experience when remotely connecting to a virtual machine running 
in Workstation 9 with a VNC client or interacting with the desktop of a 
virtual machine running on vSphere from within Workstation has been 
significantly improved.
* Disk Cleanup = "not currently available on Linux hosts" per 
http://communities.vmware.com/message/2082542 = don't care
* Quick Switch II = don't care
* Thumbnail Actions = don't care
* Saved Filters = don't care

Later,
JP
----------------------------|:::======|-------------------------------
JP Vossen, CISSP            |:::======|      http://bashcookbook.com/
My Account, My Opinions     |=========|      http://www.jpsdomain.org/
----------------------------|=========|-------------------------------
"Microsoft Tax" = the additional hardware & yearly fees for the add-on
software required to protect Windows from its own poorly designed and
implemented self, while the overhead incidentally flattens Moore's Law.

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