PDA

View Full Version : VMware Workstation 5 Beta



zenwhen
March 27th, 2005, 08:37 PM
I decided to give this thing a run today, and have to say it does feel a little faster than previous iterations, though it still obviously suffers from the lag that will always exist with emulation.

The GTK2 UI is much better than the tired GTK interface that previous versions have used, and it fits in much better with the default supported GNOME/Ubuntu desktop. The whole thing is a bit smoother, and the preferences menu is very “standard GNOMEish”.

It picked up and used the old Windows XP VM environment I had burned to a DVD a long while back when I realized I had no real use for it anymore because free software had replaced all of my needs that were previously filled by closed proprietary windows applications.

While I have to say that the whole experience is nicer, friendlier, and altogether perfect for doing a little work in Office or testing WebPages for IE compliance, I still have a major problem with the application.

Unless it is being used as a tech test bed, or in the situations described above for some work purpose, VMware remains a highly pirated crutch for Windows users switching to Linux.

I think I can safely say that the number of people who have bought VMware just to run GTA 1 and a couple multimedia applications could be counted on one hand. I would be willing to bet that the people running pirated VMware who read this thread could not.

This thread has two purposes. First of all to tell of my experiences with the new beta version and to provide a place for people to admit their sinful piracy on this holy day and turn over a new leaf, giving up their days of proprietary software, enabled by a pirated proprietary emulation application, and tell me why you are using VMware. You tell me why, and what needs it is filling and I will do my best to help you through the troubled path of removing the stain of closed and proprietary software from your life.

Here is a screenshot to help you visually understand both points.
http://zenhardwhere.com/images/workstation5.png

zenrox
March 27th, 2005, 08:42 PM
too true
/me bows to the master :mrgreen:

KLineD
March 27th, 2005, 08:48 PM
I guess that's somewhat what I feel also but you really missed a great opportunity to do an usable review of a perfectly usable piece of software (for legal purposes that's it) like, is the bug that prevented the vmware config to stay as it is now solved?? (it got something to do with ubuntu using udev?).

zenwhen
March 27th, 2005, 08:57 PM
I guess that's somewhat what I feel also but you really missed a great opportunity to do an usable review of a perfectly usable piece of software (for legal purposes that's it) like, is the bug that prevented the vmware config to stay as it is now solved?? (it got something to do with ubuntu using udev?).

First of all let me state that I was not implying that all users of VMware are morons, or anything even close to that. I was saying that some users overuse it and miss the opportunity to actually learn Linux.

And to answer your question:

Yes, that bug is fixed. With this beta version, no editing of config files is needed to run VMware in Ubuntu. Not that I condone it for regular desktop users.

KLineD
March 27th, 2005, 09:09 PM
I never said also that vmware users are morons. I just felt that there was something missing in your post that could transform it into something actually informative. But I surely feel like you when you say using vmware sometimes make new linux users to keep depending on windows. That's a big and ugly fact.

zenwhen
March 27th, 2005, 09:16 PM
I see your point as far as the amount of information contained in this threads initial post being rather sparse.

I am not at all trying to be confrontational, but VMware is pretty much VMware. I hadn't thought of the bug you spoke of and am glad you did point it out, as it was a bit of information that I had not thought of and it did add some useful data to this thread that was not originally planned.

Thanks.

KLineD
March 27th, 2005, 09:20 PM
No problem. Thanks for being so comprehensive and thanks for sharing your experience with the new vmware beta with all of us.