Ok, this is for all you programmers out there that don’t always get to rub elbows with the Ops guys…

VMWare offers free Virtualization. You may have used VMWare Workstation in the past, but what is special is VMWare Server.

This blew my mind over the weekend:

1. Install VMWare Server running on Windows 2000 Server (a Linux version also is free).
2. Download one of the many pre-made VMWare Images (Virtual Appliances) and save it on the on the local drive (I choose UltimateLAMP to have something up and running easy)
3. Install VMWare Client Tools on any PC on my network.
4. CONNECT and/or START the VMWare Image over the network.

Did you catch the difference? VMWare Workstation starts the Virtual machine, VMWare Server lets you control Virtual machines over the wire!

Yeah, this has been around awhile, but that’s both the fun and fear of technology – you just can’t get exposure to it all!

Ok, so C# transformation of an existing VB.NET project isn’t quite as “smooth” as I would like, but it brings benefits of drilling in the whole “;” syntax.

Also what comes to a screaming head is the fact that in VB.NET you can get away with a lot under “normal” circumstances. You know, the one where you don’t declare “Option Strict On”. So porting to C#, the compiler conditionally complains of things like: Cannot implicitly convert type ‘int’ to ’string’

Currently, I’m telling it what to do:

foo.ToString();

Specifically telling computers what to do is an inherently good thing for programmers. Especially if you’re a control freak like me. Another “good thing” – touch-typing.