M$ on Windows 8: Developers, Bend Over and Take It.........

[Fire$torm]

Hmm....This could lead to some interesting possibilities.

Linux > Wine > Windows Apps

From the VBox documentation, it looks as though one could create a cost free running environment for most any computer.
DOS > VBox > Any current OS

The thing is, I don't know Linux at all, in fact I don't believe I've ever even see it running.
I have a few hours experience with Ubuntu which was very easy to get the swing of, but because it wouldn't run WinApps directly,
I wasn't able to use it for the applications I needed it to run. This has mainly to do with work related application that have to run code written in VB6 and VB2010.

I will keep all of this in mind, but because I don't want to bring down any of my boxes to do experimentation on, I suppose it'll have to wait for another build so I can start from scratch and see how things go. I'd be a little concerned about performance, or the loss of, but if this proved to be minimal, then I'd consider switching all my boxes over to avoid Windows completely as I really don't care for their, "activation", cost and more importantly, the direction they are going with every new release.

OK, just to be clear, VirtualBox runs on top of Windows/Linux/MacOS/Solaris "Host" machines. It is not a MS DOS app if that is the DOS you were referring to. One caveat I forgot to mention. If you wish to create a 64bit "Guest" then the Host OS must be 64bit. But you can run 32bit Guests on a 64bit Host. And in another thread JPM or JerWA mentioned a utility for resetting Windows Vista/7 trial period indefinitely. Also, Wine is not a perfect emulator. Some WinApps refuse to run under Wine. I am not sure about VB6 or VB2010.

All in all, VirtualBox is a great idea and from my limited experience with VMware, is much much easier to setup and run. And Free never hurts

Oh BTW, since you have used Ubuntu, you have used Linux. Ubuntu is just another variant or distro of Linux. Other distros include CentOS, Gentoo, Red Hat, Mint, SuSe, etc...

[YoDude9999]

Ah yes, it seems I misunderstood their meaning when they mentioned DOS, my bad.

I did find the part where they mention VBox could present 32 virtual CPU cores to the guest OS. Visions of Aqua formulated in my mind, but I can't really see how this would be a benefit other than to increase the size of the cache for Aqua WUs. I know it works well with Hyper-Threading as Godzilla (i7 920) outputs twice the Aqua WUs over Rodan (Q9650) in roughly the same amount of time. It would be interesting just to see what would happen with that. It tends to make me think that say, if you were running single core CPU apps like RNA, yes, you could run 32 of them at the same time, but that they would take 32 times longer to finish, so there'd really be no difference. If on the other hand, they still took the same amount of time to complete, then running 32 virtual cores would be 8 times more productive than any quad core CPU, which might be something to write home about, but I just don't see that happening at all.

VBox does have my interest sparked however and the possibilities of what can had with such virtualization seem almost endless. It surely would be a great way to get into the Linux OS without having to alter my existing system, seemingly, in any way. Definitely something to look much more closely into.

[Mumps]

One caveat I forgot to mention. If you wish to create a 64bit "Guest" then the Host OS must be 64bit. But you can run 32bit Guests on a 64bit Host.

Actually, in the documentation, VBox indicates you can run 64 bit Guests even on 32 bit O/S hosts. As long as the hardware supports it...

3.1.2 64-bit guests
VirtualBox supports 64-bit guest operating systems, even on 32-bit host operating systems,2 provided
that the following conditions are met:
1. You need a 64-bit processor with hardware virtualization support (see chapter 10.3, Hardware
vs. software virtualization, page 157).
1See chapter 14, Known limitations, page 181.
264-bit guest support was added with VirtualBox 2.0; support for 64-bit guests on 32-bit hosts was added with
VirtualBox 2.1.
40
3 Configuring virtual machines
2. You must enable hardware virtualization for the particular VM for which you want 64-bit
support; software virtualization is not supported for 64-bit VMs.
3. If you want to use 64-bit guest support on a 32-bit host operating system, you must also
select a 64-bit operating system for the particular VM. Since supporting 64 bits on 32-
bit hosts incurs additional overhead, VirtualBox only enables this support upon explicit
request.
On 64-bit hosts (which typically come with hardware virtualization support), 64-bit guest
operating systems are always supported regardless of settings, so you can simply install a
64-bit operating system in the guest.
Warning: On any host, you should enable the I/O APIC for virtual machines that
you intend to use in 64-bit mode. This is especially true for 64-bit Windows VMs.
See chapter 3.3.2, “Advanced” tab, page 42. In addition, for 64-bit Windows guests,
you should make sure that the VM uses the Intel networking device, since there is
no 64-bit driver support for the AMD PCNet card; see chapter 6.1, Virtual networking
hardware, page 83.

[Fire$torm]

Actually, in the documentation, VBox indicates you can run 64 bit Guests even on 32 bit O/S hosts. As long as the hardware supports it...

OK. I stand corrected. But they do mention added overhead. So that would equate to reduced performance on the 64bit Guest, yes?

[Mumps]

OK. I stand corrected. But they do mention added overhead. So that would equate to reduced performance on the 64bit Guest, yes?

Yes, but it's not as much of a hit as you might fear. I've not run it that way personally though, so I'll have to defer to Google for an answer to that one.

As to running things like EVO on multiple VM's, absolutely. Give each one a single core and run EVO as much as you want. You can run as many VirtualBox VM's on a host as you can allocate RAM for. (Wiki calls it "unlimited.")

It can also help to "prioritize" projects for you. Have a VM running Neurona, and of course WUProp, and Neurona will always be running as long as it has work. Even if the "Host" machine is running other projects. No waiting for a "slot" to free up when that next 2 minute Neurona WU is done downloading. And when there is no Neurona work, the VM will idle with much less CPU overhead wasted.

And running a VM with more cores than the physical box has is possible, but again I've never done that. The only benefit I see on that one is when Aqua was limiting work to machines with 2 or more cores, you could get a single core machine running the project. Slowly...

[Beerdrinker]

It seems to me that with every new Windows, it get´s more complicated being a computer geek. It´s like they wanna protect us from.....Well ourselves...! And I can´t for the love of god figure out why they can make a living that way. I mean...I´t looke like they are trying to trip the very same users that they sell their product.


I am also researching Linux. I´ve started with Linux Mint. (I got that tip from a old time member back in the days Steve aka Krazy Kat) So far it looks good, and I need only 1 program to run through Wine to make a switch. Unfortunately that´s not going to well. The program is a though one to break...

But it looks like Linux is still a bit "sluggish" when it comes to desktop response. I can feel a significant difference. Apps like the browser is snappy enough once open....But it just take a second or two more to open.

I am open to suggestions on other distros. But please be advised that I am a noob. I like a graphical interface. I like point and click, since I found that Terminal langugage I will never learn.

[YoDude9999]

It seems to me that with every new Windows, it get´s more complicated being a computer geek. It´s like they wanna protect us from.....Well ourselves...! And I can´t for the love of god figure out why they can make a living that way. I mean...I´t looke like they are trying to trip the very same users that they sell their product.

As I stated in an earlier post on this thread, I don't like where MS is going with Win and I can only see that they are "herding" users into a place I just don't like. From a SW developer standpoint, I was totally dismayed with Win7, in the fact that when one of my applications installs, one of the files is placed in an area called, "Compatibility Files" which is located under a tab from the explorer window. While this does not alter the operation of the program itself, it made for a real headache in that the OS doesn't place it in an expected location, which would be the root folder of the program once it's installed, but rather a somewhat hidden location. In addition, that location has a tendency to place the file in a, "protected" state which makes manually editing the file a real pain in the arse even if you have admin privileges. I was not happy with that fact at all as this one particular file must be made available to any user to manually edit, should the need arise.

As you state, they are trying to protect us from "ourselves" and I don't like it one bit. They must be thinking that the typical user is totally clueless and perhaps this is true, but for the technical professional, this is a nightmare in progress and I only see it getting worse in the future.

[dan]

Redmond lobs a Dirty Nuke at Windows Developers. Read Ars Technica's article Why Microsoft has made developers horrified about coding for Windows 8.

End of Days for M$?

Ha Ha. Finally, Microsoft has figured out their crappy architecture is crappy. COM and friends are the worst middleware solution ever imagined (sockets make more sense). And as for MFC all I have ever been able to say about it's architecture is WTF!

Dan

[John P. Myers]

I was happy with 3.1, it worked well.
95...the worst OS I've ever used due to crashing constantly.
98...Not too bad really. They just never got the, "sleep/screen saver/power button" to work right.
XP...the best so far IMHO.
Vista...didn't like the transition, but overall acceptable. It has its quirks however.
W7...they started going into the, "Protect the user from doing harm to themselves". NOT a good thing if you're a hardware/software guy.
W8...I can only imagine how handcuffed the average user will really be, and them not knowing the difference.

If Linux ran windows apps. DAMN, MS would be gone already.....from my boxes anyway.

DOS > 98 SE > 95 > all others

Every release just becomes more and more bloated and inefficient, and the things you actually need to do become harder and harder to find. Like YoDude said, it's becoming more for little kids than for real users, like AOL did years ago.

[YoDude9999]

DOS > 98 SE > 95 > all others

Every release just becomes more and more bloated and inefficient, and the things you actually need to do become harder and harder to find. Like YoDude said, it's becoming more for little kids than for real users, like AOL did years ago.

Indeed! For instance, I guess, starting with Vista, they decided to do away with HyperTerminal. For me that really sucks because I actually have a need to use that particular program on a repetitively regular basis. Though you can get alternatives off the web that will work, I was quite accustomed to HT even as clunky as it is.

For me, this was the start of, "What the hell are they thinking?" Remove something that's actually useful, (maybe not for the majority of people, but still if you needed it, it was there and) then not even replace it with something that would still serve the same purpose. I need to have serial connectivity for a lot of things I do at work and even at home from time to time. Now it's gone and they're just making my life that much harder. We'll get rid of HT and then put in UAC to help make things a REAL pain in the arse.

I can't wait until they make it so you can't even turn off UAC and then I'm done with any new versions of Windows!