Virtual machines, containers, functions. Market knowledge for IT decision makers since 2003
Massimiliano Daneri just released a public beta of his most famous tool: VMBK.
VMBK is the popular Perl script able to peform hot backup (no suspend) of VMware ESX Server guest OSes.
The new 3.0 will finally introduce support for ESX Server 3.x.
Download the beta here.
Massimiliano Daneri just updated one of its famous tools for VMware ESX Server.
vmSSHjwc is a simple SSH console integrated in the VMware Virtual Infrastructure Web Access and available as a Java applet.
This new minor update introduces support for ESX Server 3.0.1.
Download it here.
Massimiliano Daneri just updated one of its famous tools for VMware ESX Server.
VDF+ is a Perl script enhancing standard VMware console command vdf, able to show mounted VMFS-formatted devices.
This new 2.0 version introduces support for ESX Server 3.x.
Download it here.
Kyrre Begnum and John Sechrest developed a new tool for automating creation and configuration of large virtual datacenters based on Xen and/or User-Mode Linux (UML):
MLN (Manage Large Networks) is a perl program that can be used to create a complete network of Xen or User-Mode-Linux systems from a short configuration file.
The goal is to ease the configuration and management of virtual networks. Xen and User-Mode Linux are widely used as tools for testing, learning and virtual hosting. MLN builds and configures filesystem templates based on its descriptive and easy programming language and stores them in an organized manner. It also generates start and stop scripts for each virtual host, enabling you to manage a running virtual network by stopping individual virtual machines within a network and starting them again. MLN makes it possible to have serveral separate networks, projects, at once and even connect them together to create larger networks.
Most notable features of this project are:
SysAdminMag.com published a long how-to about MLN, written by its creators. It’s worth to read it.
Download it here.
MLN could be a precious help for hosting providers. I wonder how easy could be supporting OpenVZ and VMware Server.
Pete Zerger released a great add-on for Microsoft system administrators using MOM 2005: a free Management Pack for free VMware Server 1.0.1.
This first release is already populated with 140 events rules (divided in categories for guests, hardware, resources, etc.) and sporting some notable features like monitoring of service state.
Download the Management Pack at source.
Although Parallels supports Solaris 10 in its virtual machines there are some minor issues with 1280×800 resolution of Macbooks.
Jean-Christophe Martin published a workaround for Parallels Desktop build 3036 which partially solves problems:
Create a new VM with the Solaris 10 type, but, before to finish, un-select the option to start the Solaris installation and edit the VM configuration to add a custom screen resolution of 1280×800.
Start the VM to launch the install.
Log in an create a /etc/X11/xorg.conf with something like the one attached here (xorg.conf). Basically you need to add the Modeline lines (generated with /usr/X11/bin/gtf) and put 1280×800 in the appropriate Display subsections.
Check the original post for updates and comments.
BTW: Glenn Brunette, Distinguished Engineer and Director, Global Sales and Service Security Office at Sun, took a nice screenshot of Solaris 10 with Trusted Extension (11/06) running on Parallels Desktop.
The most famous virtualization product on the planet is reaching its sixth generation. After a sneak preview at the VMworld 2006 conference, VMware finally makes Workstation 6.0 beta (and included VMware Player 2.0) available for general public.
The company aims to transform its desktop product in the preferred tools for software engineers, introducing notable features for ease development and debugging.
In fact this first beta (build 36983) sports the much acclaimed integration with Microsoft Visual Studio and Eclipse: when a new program must be tested developers can invoke run and debug directly inside a virtual machine, always assuring a brand new, secure and polished environment.
Other new features are nonetheless interesting:
Full support for 32 and 64bits version of:
Enroll for the beta here.
In further beta another killer feature called Replay is expected to appear: Workstation will be able to record every moment of the virtual machine life and reproduce it on demand, like in a VCR.
The revolutionary thing is Replay will not simply record what happens on the screen, generating a traditional video, but will record computations made on VM, allowing developers to exactly verify what happens during a fault inside virtual hardware for debugging purposes.
Effort VMware is putting in producing a must-have toolkit for software engineers is evident (this article describes how the whole company offering can simplify development, testing and delivery of new applications), but the most interesting thing anyway is introduced support for VMI-paravirtualized Linux: despite company fail in achieving VMI integration inside kernel, VMware seems to continue on its own way, probably hoping that showing a completed and working solution will increase chances to reconsider the approach.
So after introducing such support in an experimental version of Player, the company is distribuiting it mainstream through Workstation.
VMware is also slightly testing customers interest in upcoming blending of Workstation and ACE products, where the latter can be considered a superset of security features:
The virtualization.info Virtualization Industry Roadmap has been updated accordingly.
After summer 2006 acquisition of Akimbi, VMware finally release its first rebranded version of Slingshot: Lab Manager.
Lab Manager is the first product which introduces some serious datacenter automation, even if limited to development/QA scenarios.
The new 2.4 version sports a wide range of features. Among others:
but unfortunately also introduces a severe limitation: VMware GSX Server and Microsoft Virtual Server are no more supported.
It’s unclear if VMware will continue to limit integration with ESX Server or will reintroduce support for hosted products.
Download an evaluation here.
The virtualization.info Virtualization Industry Roadmap has been updated accordingly.
Xen has been updated to 3.0.4 minor release, considered an interim before 3.0.5 planned for early 2007.
This new version improves support for SMP and ACPI in Linux and Windows OSes, as well as other features:
Download it here (still not available at the moment of writing).
At the same time of Workstation 6 beta public launch, VMware opens up beta program enrollment for its first virtualization product on the Apple Mac OS: codename Fusion.
Srinivas Krishnamurti, Director of Product Management and Market Development at VMware, announced public beta on the corporate blog, The Console, underlining features in current build (36932):
Enroll for the beta here.
VMware surely is the most popular virtualization company worldwide but currently exposed features seem not enough to downsize huge success retrieved so far by the young competitor Parallels, which has been endorsed by Apple itself and which is pretty fast in releasing new builds with new notable capabilities (like Coherence).
Exactly like happened to Microsoft, VMware delay in readying a product for Apple customers as soon as Mac OS has been released for x86 architectures, could cost company serious difficulties in gaining back trust of Mac community.
More problems may raise at RTM launch time, depending on marketing strategy: if nothing free will be provided customers may start wondering why VMware offers free Player (and Server) on Windows and Linux while they have to pay on Mac OS.
