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VMWare Workstation

VMware Debuts Workstation 8

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VMware today announced the availability of VMware Workstation 8, offering a way to build, share and upload virtual machines (VMs) to VMware vSphere.

With more than 50 new features, VMware Workstation 8 advances the way technical professionals can work with multiple virtual machines from their PCs or on enterprise private clouds.

VMware Workstation 8 is immediately available for purchase for $199. Upgrades from VMware Workstation 6.x and 7.x are available for $99.

VMware Customers who have purchased VMware Workstation 8 between Aug. 1, 2011 and Sept. 30, 2011 are eligible for a complimentary electronic upgrade to VMware Workstation 8.

Workstation can also be purchased through VMware’s network of resellers and distributors.

SpringSource Partners Up With VMware For Spring-Powered Enterprise Virtualization Offering

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SpringSource today announced at SpringOne Americas 2008 a new relationship with VMware that will help organizations to seamlessly develop and deploy Spring applications in VMware virtualized environments.

The collaboration with VMware, a SpringSource Certified Solutions Partner, includes integration between SpringSource Tool Suite, an Eclipse-powered development environment for building enterprise applications using the Spring Portfolio, and VMware Workstation to enable the dynamic creation of virtual machines on developer desktops.

SpringSource is also developing two open source application-server virtual appliances – the SpringSource tc Server and dm Server virtual appliances. When run on VMware Infrastructure, these appliances will enable the portability of enterprise Java applications across desktop and data center environments. SpringSource dm Server is a completely modular, OSGi-based Java server designed to run enterprise Java applications and Spring-powered applications with a new degree of flexibility and reliability. SpringSource tc Server is the enterprise version of Apache Tomcat – the most widely used Java application server – hardened for enterprise use and coupled with mission-critical operational capabilities and support that systems administrators require.

SpringSource Tool Suite integration with VMware Workstation will enable development and QA professionals to quickly and easily specify virtual server configurations for different development and test scenarios. These virtual appliances will allow developers to select a variety of build targets with different operating systems and application server configurations without needing additional physical hardware – dramatically accelerating software development times and reducing hardware costs. Virtual appliance configuration, deployment and debugging will be integrated with the SpringSource Tool Suite, and ready-to-use virtual images will be provided for dm Server, tc Server and Apache Tomcat.

The first SpringSource/VMware commercial offerings are scheduled for availability in January 2009.

VMware Releases Server 2.0, Workstation 6.5, ACE 2.5

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VMware has announced the availability of its free server class virtualization product, VMware Server 2.0, a free hosted virtualization product for Microsoft Windows and Linux servers that has been around for quite some time.

Workstation 6.5, its long running desktop virtualization platform has also hit the wires, and finally ACE hit the 2.5 mark.

(VMblog gives a run-down of the new stuff in VMware Server 2.0, Workstation 6.5 and ACE 2.5)

VMware

VMware Online Store Now Has Academic Discounts on Workstation and Fusion

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For current students, prospective university students, or academic faculty and staff, VMware has just made it easier to purchase VMware Workstation or VMware Fusion at an academic discount. Through the all new academic portal, students can get a discount to up to 50% off the commercial list pricing if they purchase VMware Workstation or VMware Fusion for personal use.

Previously, the only way to get access to VMware Fusion or VMware Workstation at their academic prices was to purchase at an outlet like a campus book store that happened to stock the software.

LiveTime Software Ships New Service Desk Virtual Appliance for Sun xVM and VMware

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LiveTime Software, a provider of ITIL certified Service Management and Help Desk Software, today released version 2.0 of its integrated virtual appliance consisting of its Java technology based JeOS (Just Enough Operating System) and ITIL Service Management software. The new release features support for both Sun xVM and VMware, and aims to leverage the power of both virtualization architectures at both the desktop and server levels.

The combination of LiveTime’s ITIL based Service Management and Sun xVM gives customers and SaaS providers a way to leverage their existing resources. LiveTime says it has improved the performance of its JeOS by approximately 20% and has decreased the memory overhead to 128Mb, enabling higher concurrency and increasing the number of virtual machines per server. This is particularly important for SaaS providers who deploy separate LiveTime instances per client and for multi-tenant requirements. The appliance also includes support for symmetric multiprocessing for optimal performance across virtualized CPU’s.

LiveTime’s virtual appliance includes built-in debugging, configuration and management utilities. Guided menus provide easy access to networking, upgrades and general system utilities. The LiveTime Virtual appliance currently supports all Sun xVM and VMware virtualization platforms, including Sun xVM VirtualBox, VMware Player, Workstation, Fusion, Server and ESX Server.

The LiveTime Virtual appliance supports Sun xVM VirtualBox, enabling developers to easily build, test and run cross-platform, multi-tier applications on a single laptop or desktop computer.

Organizations can now leverage LiveTime’s ITIL Service Management software with the ease of installation of traditional software. The virtual appliance should provide the necessary scalability and security that is difficult to achieve when deployed on existing hardware and operating systems. Since the system has been hardened at the operating system layer, LiveTime provides Just Enough Operating System for its needs. This makes the system easy to update and maintain and provides a very small footprint and a 160MB download.

Release: VMware Workstation 6.5 Beta 2

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VMWare has released Beta 2 of Workstation 6.5, expected to be released during Q3 2008.

Here are the highlights of the new release:

  • Virtual Machine streaming – download VM’s from a web server and power it on before it’s even finished downloading
  • Installer for Linux
  • Record/Replay Debugging functionality (proclaimed b VMWare as “experimental”; be a bit skeptical at this stage)
  • Unity enhancements
  • Clipboard enhancements
  • Virtual Machine Communication Interface (VMCI) improvements
  • enhancements to “vmrun”
  • more features

Read the release notes here, enroll for the beta here.

[Source: VMHero]