Yesterday in a public webinar VMware announced the upcoming release of Studio 2.0, the environment to author OVF packages that the company launched in September 2008.
The new VMware Studio 2.0 is remarkable in terms of new features.
The first most important is that it will support the new generation of virtual appliances (VAs) that VMware calls vApps.
The vApp is a concept that VMware introduced for the first time at VMworld 2008, and it implies a new metadata layer wrapping the virtual appliance what describes the virtual hardware, performance and security requirements to run the virtual machine.
Once created the virtual appliance or the vApp, Studio 2.0 will be able to deliver it on VMware Workstation, Server (both 1.x and 2.x) and of course VI/vSphere.
The most interesting thing about this last interaction is that Studio can push (and update at a later time) the new VA/vApp through VMware Update Manager (VUM).
Another two key features are the capability to author/build Windows virtual machines and the capability to use an existing virtual machine as input.
Studio 2.0 itself will be delivered as a virtual appliance, featuring Ubuntu Linux as the OS of choice.
Developers will be able to interact with it through a web browser, CLI or a plug-in for Eclipse.
Thanks to vinternals for the news.