VMware Infrastructure 4.0, or vSphere as the company decided to call the platform now, will finally feature a version of vCenter Server (formerly VirtualCenter) for Linux.
This major new capability was not part of the features that virtualization.info published in September 2008 about the upcoming ESX 4.0. But the abstract of a VMworld Europe 2009 session (DC08 here) confirms:
Customer demand for vCenter Server running on Linux has been astounding. While the majority of the Code is inherently cross platform, getting vCenter Server to run on Linux in a manner compatible with the current set of features has its own set of challenges. This presentation will discuss the issues of cross platform development for vCenter, including issues regarding internationalization support, database support, multi-vCenter support, and image customization. The talk will conclude with a live demonstration of the latest development version of vCenter Server running on Linux.