Latest Release: 4.0.0 Beta 1 (October 2, 2009)

VMware View Open Client version 4.0.0 Beta 1 is now available on the Downloads page.

Please see the release announcement for a summary of what’s included in this release.

Features

Some of the features included are:

• Ability to create a secure tunnel using SSL
• Support for two factor authentication with RSA SecurID
• Novell SLETC Add-On RPM package
• Full command line interface

The following features are NOT included in this release:

• USB redirection
• Multiple desktop sessions
• Multimedia redirection

For a full list of features please refer to the README.txt file available with the distribution.

Compatibility

This release is compatible with VMware Virtual Desktop Manager (VDM) 2.0, 2.1, and VMware View Manager 3.0 and 3.1.

If I have some time on my hands I will try to make a bootable stripped Linux CD that holds this client, or maybe a USB key is a better idea…. let me think about it.

igibbs@host:/images$ vmware-vdiskmanager -c -t 0 -a ide -s 236GB fs1-images.vmdk
Creating disk '/images/fs1-images.vmdk'
Failed to create disk: The file is too big for the filesystem (0xc00000015).

Err, no it’s not. The maximum file size for ext3 and ext4 is 16TB, for ext4 will eventually be 1,048,576TB (or 1EB). To my knowledge, that’s not block size-dependent like VMFS is. Eventually it turned out that I could create a pre-allocated disk (-t 2) of 236GB but not a sparse disk (-t 0) of 236GB:

igibbs@host:/images$ vmware-vdiskmanager -c -t 2 -a ide -s 236GB fs1-images.vmdk
Creating disk 'fs1-images.vmdk'
Create: 0% done.

Hope this helps someone. I presume it’s caused by Workstation not recognising ext4 properly.

If you are still looking for an invite, I received another 50 and it’s on a first come first serves base. Just click here for an invitation.

(update: the invites don’t seem to be working, I will ask Bluebear to fix it asap.)

In short: VMware View Open Client calls rdesktop, if you add a script with the name rdesktop to your path you can add several commandline options:

1. Create a script called /usr/local/bin/rdesktop
2. The script needs to contain the following:
   #!/bin/bash
   /usr/bin/rdesktop -r ‘disk:media=/media’ “$@”
3. Add “/usr/local/bin/” to the PATH variable and make sure it’s inserted before the original location of the rdesktop(usually /usr/bin) binary.

The -r option adds USB redirection, but you could use any of the other rdesktop commandline options to achieve the desired functionality.

This document describes how to install a technical preview of the Linux version of VirtualCenter server. The intended audience is developers, system administrators, and managers interested in using VirtualCenter on a Linux operating system.

CAUTION   Do not use this version of VirtualCenter on Linux for production purposes. This release is for evaluation purposes only.

Keep in mind this is only the vCenter server for Linux, not the client! And also keep in mind that it’s for evaluation only, please don’t use this in a production environment! If I can download it I will give it a spin tonight!

In a virtual world, where footprint matters, it can be really beneficial to use JeOS vm’s. Although JeOS sounds great one of the problems used to be creating JeOS vm’s. Of course you can download a Debian Netinstall CD and just pick the packages you think you need, but it’s a lot of work. Ubuntu also released a JeOS version of their Server OS but it’s targetted at ISV’s and not for your average sysadmin as the “howto” clearly shows.

Suse, owned by Novell these days, developed a portal called Suse Studio. Suse Studio lets you create JeOS VM’s, not only VM’s but also Live CD’s etc. Creating a JeOS is just a matter of a couple of clicks and downloading the VM! Creating a VM that contained OpenSuse 11.1 & gnome, with OpenOffice and Tomboy as extra took me little over 11 minutes, that includes building the VM and picking the packages I wanted to include. These are the steps I needed to taked:

First pick your basics

Give your new appliance a name

Choose the desired software

Which can be done by typing keywords, for example add Tomboy to your JeOS VM

Change your OS configuration

Even change the VM specific configuraton options

Add your own packages to the JeOS

What do you want to build, a VM, Live CD or Disk(HDD/USB) Image?

Build the VM

Download it or testdrive it

Final step, the test drive, it runs remote with Java

Now you might say why would I want a GUI? It’s just an example, you can also create a text only VM as you can see in the first screenshot. You can choose what ever you want, you can even include your own packages. The best thing is that you can test drive it before you download the complete package!

Suse Studio is still in Alpha phase. I hope they will be able to even reduce the size of the basic packages, for the “text version only” a bare minimum package would be welcome and an bare minimum xfce desktop would also be a nice enhancement.

You can find more info here, and watch a youtube promo here. I must say, and my former colleagues will probably laugh out loud, Novell / Suse is doing one hell of a job!

VMware View Open Client is available under the GNU Lesser General Public License version 2.1 (LGPL v 2.1) and is accessible from http://code.google.com/p/vmware-view-open-client/. Some of the features included in this release support secure tunneling using SSL, two factor authentication with RSA SecurID, Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise Thin Client Add-On RPM package and a full command line interface. Support for the source code distribution is available through the VMware View Open Client community at: http://code.google.com/p/vmware-view-open-client/.

I’ve just downloaded the PRM and installed it on OpenSuse 11.1 without a problem:

Now I would need to request a virtual desktop so I can actually use the client.

Not only can you lock your pc, but you can also unlock it or kick off any script you like. It should be possible to do the following: Lock PC, set Pidgin messenger to away, mute audio… The list is endless. Read the extensive Ubuntu how to here. Thanks Patrick for sharing.

xkeymap.nokeycodeMap = true

This was added manually so I could still use key combo’s like “ctrl-alt-ins”. But on the machine that does have a working Unity mode I implemented the second option described in this blog post.

So I decided to also implement this on my 64bit Ubuntu 8.10 workstation. After restarting VMware workstation this was the result:

Windows Event Viewer running on Ubuntu 8.10 in Unity mode…

• 2 x F11 to show the title bar again
• Resize the browser just a bit smaller than your window
• Click on maximize

Problem fixed.