What Car Thieves Think of the Club - Freakonomics Blog - NYTimes.com: "What Car Thieves Think of the Club
By STEPHEN J. DUBNER
In the SuperFreakonomics chapter on global warming, we describe pollution as a negative externality, a cost that is generally borne by someone other than the party producing the waste. In so doing, we discuss the difference between two anti-theft devices for cars, the Club and LoJack. Because LoJack is a hidden device and thieves cannot therefore know which cars have it and which don’t, it cuts down on overall theft. Which means it produces the rare positive externality. The Club, meanwhile, works in the opposite manner:
The Club is big and highly visible (it even comes in neon pink). By using a Club, you are explicitly telling a potential thief that your car will be hard to steal. The implicit signal, meanwhile, is that your neighbor’s car — the one without a Club — is a much better target. So your Club produces a negative externality for your non-Club-using neighbor in the form of a higher risk that his car will be stolen. The Club is a perfect exercise in self-interest.
Having read this passage, a man named Jim Burns wrote in with an interesting background story:
Back in the ’90s, I was working as a design engineer for Chrysler. I had responsibility for key cylinders and door latches. At that time auto theft rates in Europe were increasing and driving the insurers to put pressure on the Euro governments to require increased theft deterrence devices on all new cars. As part of our attempt to figure out where best to invest our design dollars, we hired some professional car thieves to provide a more hands-on perspective than us engineers had (well, maybe not all of us).
At some point, the Club was mentioned. The professional thieves laughed and exchanged knowing glances. What we knew was that the Club is a hardened steel device that attaches to the steering wheel and the brake pedal to prevent steering and/or braking. What we found out was that a pro thief would carry a short piece of a hacksaw blade to cut through the plastic steering wheel in a couple seconds. They were then able to release The Club and use it to apply a huge amount of torque to the steering wheel and break the lock on the steering column (which most cars were already equipped with). The pro thieves actually sought out cars with The Club on them because they didn’t want to carry a long pry bar that was too hard to conceal.
Ah, the beauty of unintended consequences. And do not pass too quickly over the fact that a car company hires car thieves for consultation. If you are a businessperson, do you regularly engage those who wish to do you harm? If you are an intellectual, do you regularly sit down with those who wish to call you names?
- Sent using Google Toolbar"
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Thursday, June 3, 2010
A Brief History of the Gaza Folly | The American Prospect
A Brief History of the Gaza Folly | The American Prospect: "A Brief History of the Gaza Folly
The flotilla attack is just the latest in a series of bad decisions Israel has made about Gaza over the past five years.
Gershom Gorenberg | June 1, 2010 | web only
A Brief History of the Gaza Folly
Palestinian flags wave in Gaza port a day before a flotilla of aid ships was to arrive. (AP Photo/Hatem Moussa)
At first, reports of the number of dead fluctuated by the hour. After Israeli naval commandos landed on a Turkish ferry heading for Gaza, rumors said that Sheikh Raed Salah, leader of the radical Islamic movement among Israeli Arabs, had been killed on board. The rumors turned into news items in the Arab media; the sheikh was then reported alive and well. Descriptions of what actually happened on the crowded deck of the Mavi Marmara have, predictably, been wildly at odds. Activists who were on board say the Israeli commandos fired before being attacked; the Israeli military says the soldiers were defending themselves from a mob. Both sides present film clips of the nighttime struggle to back up their case.
Out of this blurred picture, one thing seems agonizingly clear: The raid was a link in a chain of premeditated folly.
Let's follow that chain, from the news reports backward. To deflect criticism, Israeli army sources have told the press that the commandos faced a 'lynch' when they descended by ropes from helicopters onto the Mavi Marmara -- the largest boat in the flotilla intended to break Israel's blockade on Gaza. Inside Israel, the word 'lynch' stirs a very loaded memory: the mob murder of two Israeli soldiers who strayed into the West Bank city of Ramallah at the start of the Second Intifada in 2000.
Yet the word emphasizes the stark difference between the two events. The commandos didn't stray onto the ferry's deck. They boarded it in a planned operation. If, as Israel Defense Forces footage seems to show, people on the boat's deck greeted them with knives and clubs, it means that at least some of the activists decided in advance that nonviolence wasn't their strategy. Nonetheless, they weren't lynching anyone; they were attempting to stop a boarding party in international waters. The Israeli Foreign Ministry argues that interdicting a ship on the high seas to enforce a declared blockade is legal under international law. It should have been no surprise, however, that the boarding would meet resistance from the 679 people aboard the ship -- a mix of pro-Palestinian activists from the international Free Gaza Movement; members of the Turkish Islamic relief group Insani Yardim Vakfi; and a handful of prominent Israeli Arabs.
That takes us back a link: The decision to send a handful of commandos to seize the ship -- a decision approved by Prime Minister Netanyahu and his inner circle of ministers -- shows hubris, poor intelligence work, and determined inability to learn from experience. Both the politicians and the generals expected that the arrival of Israeli soldiers would convince the crew and passengers to submit. And yet, a day before the boarding, Israel Radio cited an Al-Jazeera report that people aboard the ship said they were ready to die. The Israel Radio reporter described that attitude as 'paranoia.' He didn't consider the possibility that those aboard were ready for a fight. It seems that military intelligence also failed to examine clues in plain sight.
The naval commandos are an elite unit, trained for daring operations. Controlling an angry crowd of civilians armed with knives and slingshots isn't in their job description. The riot equipment they got for this mission was insufficient. Outnumbered, they resorted to live fire. But riot control has long been an Israeli weak point. In 1990, outnumbered police fired on Palestinian demonstrators on the Temple Mount, killing a score of people and causing an international crisis. In 2000, police used live fire after Ariel Sharon's visit to the same holy site, killing several Palestinian protesters and igniting the Second Intifada. Yet before the 2005 evacuation of Jewish settlers in Gaza, troops and police got weeks of training in crowd control and self-restraint. Deployed en masse, they were able to subdue violent protesters without fatalities. Somehow, the comparative lessons weren't learned before this week's deadly fiasco.
Perhaps there's no way to use sophisticated crowd-control methods while boarding a ship. But that problem only leads us further back, to the decision to stop the flotilla. True, if Israel had allowed six ships, their passengers, and their cargo of humanitarian aid to reach Gaza, the siege of the Hamas-controlled territory would have been breached beyond repair.
But the Israeli siege itself is another link in the chain of folly. It was imposed in stages after Hamas' election victory in January 2006, the abduction of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit later that year, and the Hamas takeover of Gaza in 2007. Limited supplies are allowed through at land crossings -- and a shifting list of civilian goods are blocked. Instead, they reach Gaza through smuggling tunnels from Egypt, along with arms. The siege hasn't convinced Hamas to return Shalit. It hasn't sparked a popular revolt against Hamas rule. It has encouraged smuggling, caused suffering, and amplified foreign criticism of Israel. The flotilla was a missed chance for a long-needed review of Israel's policies toward Hamas since the pullout from Gaza in 2005.
So we move back one more link, to then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon decision's to leave Gaza unilaterally, rather than as part of a peace agreement with the Palestinian Authority. Sharon knew that reaching an agreement would mean yielding nearly all of the West Bank as well. He saw the Gaza withdrawal as a way to avoid making such a deal. But the unilateral pullout weakened Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas, an advocate of a negotiated peace, and legitimized Hamas and its 'armed struggle.'
Before and after the raid, Israeli officials referred to the flotilla as a 'provocation' intended to harm Israel. That's probably true -- and only raises the question of why Israel allowed itself to be provoked. Part of the answer lies in a cognitive failure in understanding events long before 2005.
To explain, I need to turn for a moment to what I can only call an omen that occurred the day before the raid: At age 89, veteran Israeli dissident Lova Eliav died. In 1968, as a rising politician in the Labor Party, Eliav shocked his comrades by declaring that the Palestinians must be recognized as a people, that Israel must negotiate with them and give up the occupied territories. His heresy came after he spent months in the towns and refugee camps of Gaza and the West Bank, listening to Palestinians. It was a product of empathy, reason and the ability to believe in both peace and patriotism. He was driven from the party to the left margins of politics. Decades later, his ideas moved into the mainstream.
One more detail of his resumé: In 1947, as a young man, Eliav was the commander of a ship called the Haim Arlosoroff, which tried to bring Holocaust survivors to Palestine in defiance of British immigration limits. The voyage ended off the coast of Haifa when British marines took control of the ship. The would-be immigrants were interred in Cyprus. Eliav's mission was not a failure, though. It was one step in a campaign that stirred the world against British policy and led to the establishment of Israel.
Were Israel's current leaders able to read the past as Eliav did, to see oneself in one's adversary, they would have seen the implications of the voyage of the Mavi Marmara and the folly of interdicting it. They might even understand that their consistent effort to avoid a two-state solution is a mistake. Eliav embodied a heroic, humanistic Zionism. The omen of his passing was ignored. It remains for Israelis who believe in his path to demand that the government finally break the chain of folly.
- Sent using Google Toolbar"
The flotilla attack is just the latest in a series of bad decisions Israel has made about Gaza over the past five years.
Gershom Gorenberg | June 1, 2010 | web only
A Brief History of the Gaza Folly
Palestinian flags wave in Gaza port a day before a flotilla of aid ships was to arrive. (AP Photo/Hatem Moussa)
At first, reports of the number of dead fluctuated by the hour. After Israeli naval commandos landed on a Turkish ferry heading for Gaza, rumors said that Sheikh Raed Salah, leader of the radical Islamic movement among Israeli Arabs, had been killed on board. The rumors turned into news items in the Arab media; the sheikh was then reported alive and well. Descriptions of what actually happened on the crowded deck of the Mavi Marmara have, predictably, been wildly at odds. Activists who were on board say the Israeli commandos fired before being attacked; the Israeli military says the soldiers were defending themselves from a mob. Both sides present film clips of the nighttime struggle to back up their case.
Out of this blurred picture, one thing seems agonizingly clear: The raid was a link in a chain of premeditated folly.
Let's follow that chain, from the news reports backward. To deflect criticism, Israeli army sources have told the press that the commandos faced a 'lynch' when they descended by ropes from helicopters onto the Mavi Marmara -- the largest boat in the flotilla intended to break Israel's blockade on Gaza. Inside Israel, the word 'lynch' stirs a very loaded memory: the mob murder of two Israeli soldiers who strayed into the West Bank city of Ramallah at the start of the Second Intifada in 2000.
Yet the word emphasizes the stark difference between the two events. The commandos didn't stray onto the ferry's deck. They boarded it in a planned operation. If, as Israel Defense Forces footage seems to show, people on the boat's deck greeted them with knives and clubs, it means that at least some of the activists decided in advance that nonviolence wasn't their strategy. Nonetheless, they weren't lynching anyone; they were attempting to stop a boarding party in international waters. The Israeli Foreign Ministry argues that interdicting a ship on the high seas to enforce a declared blockade is legal under international law. It should have been no surprise, however, that the boarding would meet resistance from the 679 people aboard the ship -- a mix of pro-Palestinian activists from the international Free Gaza Movement; members of the Turkish Islamic relief group Insani Yardim Vakfi; and a handful of prominent Israeli Arabs.
That takes us back a link: The decision to send a handful of commandos to seize the ship -- a decision approved by Prime Minister Netanyahu and his inner circle of ministers -- shows hubris, poor intelligence work, and determined inability to learn from experience. Both the politicians and the generals expected that the arrival of Israeli soldiers would convince the crew and passengers to submit. And yet, a day before the boarding, Israel Radio cited an Al-Jazeera report that people aboard the ship said they were ready to die. The Israel Radio reporter described that attitude as 'paranoia.' He didn't consider the possibility that those aboard were ready for a fight. It seems that military intelligence also failed to examine clues in plain sight.
The naval commandos are an elite unit, trained for daring operations. Controlling an angry crowd of civilians armed with knives and slingshots isn't in their job description. The riot equipment they got for this mission was insufficient. Outnumbered, they resorted to live fire. But riot control has long been an Israeli weak point. In 1990, outnumbered police fired on Palestinian demonstrators on the Temple Mount, killing a score of people and causing an international crisis. In 2000, police used live fire after Ariel Sharon's visit to the same holy site, killing several Palestinian protesters and igniting the Second Intifada. Yet before the 2005 evacuation of Jewish settlers in Gaza, troops and police got weeks of training in crowd control and self-restraint. Deployed en masse, they were able to subdue violent protesters without fatalities. Somehow, the comparative lessons weren't learned before this week's deadly fiasco.
Perhaps there's no way to use sophisticated crowd-control methods while boarding a ship. But that problem only leads us further back, to the decision to stop the flotilla. True, if Israel had allowed six ships, their passengers, and their cargo of humanitarian aid to reach Gaza, the siege of the Hamas-controlled territory would have been breached beyond repair.
But the Israeli siege itself is another link in the chain of folly. It was imposed in stages after Hamas' election victory in January 2006, the abduction of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit later that year, and the Hamas takeover of Gaza in 2007. Limited supplies are allowed through at land crossings -- and a shifting list of civilian goods are blocked. Instead, they reach Gaza through smuggling tunnels from Egypt, along with arms. The siege hasn't convinced Hamas to return Shalit. It hasn't sparked a popular revolt against Hamas rule. It has encouraged smuggling, caused suffering, and amplified foreign criticism of Israel. The flotilla was a missed chance for a long-needed review of Israel's policies toward Hamas since the pullout from Gaza in 2005.
So we move back one more link, to then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon decision's to leave Gaza unilaterally, rather than as part of a peace agreement with the Palestinian Authority. Sharon knew that reaching an agreement would mean yielding nearly all of the West Bank as well. He saw the Gaza withdrawal as a way to avoid making such a deal. But the unilateral pullout weakened Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas, an advocate of a negotiated peace, and legitimized Hamas and its 'armed struggle.'
Before and after the raid, Israeli officials referred to the flotilla as a 'provocation' intended to harm Israel. That's probably true -- and only raises the question of why Israel allowed itself to be provoked. Part of the answer lies in a cognitive failure in understanding events long before 2005.
To explain, I need to turn for a moment to what I can only call an omen that occurred the day before the raid: At age 89, veteran Israeli dissident Lova Eliav died. In 1968, as a rising politician in the Labor Party, Eliav shocked his comrades by declaring that the Palestinians must be recognized as a people, that Israel must negotiate with them and give up the occupied territories. His heresy came after he spent months in the towns and refugee camps of Gaza and the West Bank, listening to Palestinians. It was a product of empathy, reason and the ability to believe in both peace and patriotism. He was driven from the party to the left margins of politics. Decades later, his ideas moved into the mainstream.
One more detail of his resumé: In 1947, as a young man, Eliav was the commander of a ship called the Haim Arlosoroff, which tried to bring Holocaust survivors to Palestine in defiance of British immigration limits. The voyage ended off the coast of Haifa when British marines took control of the ship. The would-be immigrants were interred in Cyprus. Eliav's mission was not a failure, though. It was one step in a campaign that stirred the world against British policy and led to the establishment of Israel.
Were Israel's current leaders able to read the past as Eliav did, to see oneself in one's adversary, they would have seen the implications of the voyage of the Mavi Marmara and the folly of interdicting it. They might even understand that their consistent effort to avoid a two-state solution is a mistake. Eliav embodied a heroic, humanistic Zionism. The omen of his passing was ignored. It remains for Israelis who believe in his path to demand that the government finally break the chain of folly.
- Sent using Google Toolbar"
Towards an ethics-based complement to scripture in NSW primary schools | St James Ethics Centre
Towards an ethics-based complement to scripture in NSW primary schools | St James Ethics Centre: "Towards an ethics-based complement to scripture in NSW primary schools
Photograph of school children.
'Dear Minister, Please approve the pilot!'
Presented by:
NSW Federation of P and C Associations
St James Ethics Centre
The Need for Change
Did you know that children whose parents make a conscientious decision to have them opt out of Special Religious Education (SRE) are prohibited from any form of instruction during this period? NSW Department of Education policy provides for the supervision of these children but specifies they are not to have access to 'ethics, values, civics or general religious education.'
Not surprisingly, many view the existing policy as socially and psychologically unjust — all students are entitled to meaningful instruction, ethical exploration and the associated benefits.
Based on mounting community interest and support, St James Ethics Centre, proposed a pilot project to test the concept of offering an ethics-based complement to scripture.
Minister Firth says YES! to trial an ethics-based complement to scripture
St James Ethics Centre welcomed the announcement on 25 November 2009 by Premier Nathan Rees approving its proposal to conduct a pilot program for an ethics-based complement to scripture in ten NSW primary schools.
More details regarding the Premier’s announcement are available here.
The Centre takes this opportunity to acknowledge the generous support it has received in relation to this initiative. We thank all those who have been part of the project so far and look forward to working with you in the future.
Project update
The 10-week trial at ten NSW Primary schools is currently underway and will last through Term 2, 2010. Professor Phillip Cam from the University of New South Wales, an international expert in the teaching of ethics and philosophy to children, has written the pilot curriculum. Thirty three volunteers from within each school community have been recruited and trained as ethics teachers. More information about the Ethics Pilot is available here.
- Sent using Google Toolbar"
Photograph of school children.
'Dear Minister, Please approve the pilot!'
Presented by:
NSW Federation of P and C Associations
St James Ethics Centre
The Need for Change
Did you know that children whose parents make a conscientious decision to have them opt out of Special Religious Education (SRE) are prohibited from any form of instruction during this period? NSW Department of Education policy provides for the supervision of these children but specifies they are not to have access to 'ethics, values, civics or general religious education.'
Not surprisingly, many view the existing policy as socially and psychologically unjust — all students are entitled to meaningful instruction, ethical exploration and the associated benefits.
Based on mounting community interest and support, St James Ethics Centre, proposed a pilot project to test the concept of offering an ethics-based complement to scripture.
Minister Firth says YES! to trial an ethics-based complement to scripture
St James Ethics Centre welcomed the announcement on 25 November 2009 by Premier Nathan Rees approving its proposal to conduct a pilot program for an ethics-based complement to scripture in ten NSW primary schools.
More details regarding the Premier’s announcement are available here.
The Centre takes this opportunity to acknowledge the generous support it has received in relation to this initiative. We thank all those who have been part of the project so far and look forward to working with you in the future.
Project update
The 10-week trial at ten NSW Primary schools is currently underway and will last through Term 2, 2010. Professor Phillip Cam from the University of New South Wales, an international expert in the teaching of ethics and philosophy to children, has written the pilot curriculum. Thirty three volunteers from within each school community have been recruited and trained as ethics teachers. More information about the Ethics Pilot is available here.
- Sent using Google Toolbar"
Forever For Now - VMWare Player Image Creation
Forever For Now - VMWare Player Image Creation: "Forever For Now
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VMWare Player Image Creation
Introduction
Background
VMWare recently introduced their VMWare Player and VMWare Server products for Windows and Linux. They offer some premade disk images for use with the Player and Server technology, but they do not offer software to create new virtual machines or images. Luckily you can create them on your own without too much hassle.
I'm using VMWare Player under both Ubuntu Linux 5.04 Hoary Hedgehog and Ubuntu Linux 5.10 Breezy Badger. Installing the software is fairly straightforward and there are some great guides over at the Ubuntu forum on how to do this.
The trick to getting more out the VMWare Player and VMWare Server than a few premade images is actually two-fold, let me guide you through the process of almost getting a free VMWare Workstation replacement.
In this article I'll be referring mostly to VMWare Player, but you can also create VMWare Server images using the steps described.
A Fresh Start
Zero entropy
One of the 'problems' you could have with the premade images for VMWare Player is that they don't come in the sizes and formatting you'd like. Also, since they are already filled with data you don't really benefit from sparse file support from your filesystem once you format them from within the virtual machine.
The best thing to have would be a clean hard disk image in a reasonable size which you could use to format. If you start off with a nearly empty hard disk image, a filesystem like ext2 or ext3, will be able to detect the file as being sparse and optimize its usage accordingly.
There are two ways to get a clean disk image for your virtual machine.
Using QEMU
QEMU is an open source virtualization solution written by Fabrice Bellard. It supports a wide array of host operating systems and architectures and is able to virtualize a few different architectures as well. QEMU comes bundled with some tools related to virtualization and emulation.
In one of the more recent versions, a tool called qemu-img is included. Using this tool you can create empty disk images for use with QEMU, but also for use with VMWare products like VMWare Player. This tool can easily be installed on a Linux system.
But if you want to save some time, here's option two.
Download empty VMWare Player images
I've got some empty VMWare disk images available for download. They're compressed as ZIP files and because they are empty the files are very small. Uncompressing them on your own system will enable sparse files support, so don't worry once you start unpacking the larger disk images.
The empty disk images come in three sizes: 500 megabytes, 10 gigabytes and 20 gigabytes. I reckon these should be large enough for all but the most demanding users.
Download the empty VMWare Player disk images:
* VMWare Player SCSI disk image, 500 megabytes unpacked (.ZIP, 1 Kb)
* VMWare Player SCSI disk image, 10 gigabytes unpacked (.ZIP, 3 Kb)
* VMWare Player SCSI disk image, 20 gigabytes unpacked (.ZIP, 5 Kb)
* VMWare Player IDE disk image, 20 gigabytes unpacked (.ZIP, 5 Kb)
The disk images above are freely available on the Internet. Use the IDE disk image for installing Windows 2000, Windows XP or other Windows operating systems in your Player.
So, with the first barricade out of the way, let's look at the second problem: a so-called VMX file which contains the virtual machines description and properties.
Configuration Cleaning
Boilerplate
As I said earlier, you'll only need a VMWare Disk Image (a VMDK file) and a VMX file which describes the virtual machine. I've already presented you with three disk image downloads, and here is one file you can use as a template for your new virtual machines.
* VMWare Player Virtual Machine Template for Linux, BSD, UNIX and other guest operating systems (.VMX, 1 Kb)
* VMWare Player Virtual Machine Template for Windows operating systems (.VMX, 1 Kb)
If you are getting errors regarding a mismatch between the disk images using LSI Logic formatting and the template using a Bus Logic virtual SCSI device, please download the template again. I've updated it to use the correct LSI Logic SCSI device.
The second download link is the template you want to use with the IDE disk image to run Microsoft Windows inside the virtual machine. This second template uses an IDE disk which is compatible with Windows.
Customizing the template
Once you've downloaded the configuration file template, rename it to suit your needs and open it up in a text editor like vi, emacs or Notepad if you're using Windows. The first few lines are the ones above '# DEFAULT SETTINGS UNDER THIS LINE' and they look like this:
#!/usr/bin/vmware
displayName = 'Linux 2.6.x Host'
guestOS = 'other26xlinux'
memsize = '512'
scsi0:0.fileName = '10G.vmdk'
ide1:0.fileName = 'cdrom.iso'
The first line with the shebang can be ignored safely. The next few lines set a few options for the virtual machine, I'll explain these one by one.
* displayName defines the name of the virtual machine you will see in the titlebar and VMWare Player menu, you can use a long descriptive string if you want.
* guestOS is a short code for the operating system you will be running in the virtual machine. I have included a list of all possible values below.
* memsize defines the amount memory available to the virtual machine in megabytes. Valid entries are 32, 64, 128, 256, 512 and 1024.
* scsi0:0.fileName defines the hard disk image for the SCSI hard disk in the virtual machine. Use one of the downloads above to get the VMDK files.
* ide0:0.fileName defines the hard disk image for the IDE hard disk in the virtual machine. Use the IDE downloads above to get the VMDK file. This IDE disk allows you to run Microsoft Windows.
* ide1:0.fileName defines the ISO file to use in the CD-ROM drive of the virtual machine. The filename is relative to the working directory.
Needless to say, you should change the values in the template to suit your needs.
Supported Virtual Machine Operating Systems
One setting to rule them all
VMWare Player can be tweaked to perform better when virtualizing certain operating systems. Here is a list with all supported guest operating systems which you can enter in the guestOS parameter in the VMX configuration file.
Microsoft Windows, 32-bit
* winVista = Windows Vista (experimental)
* longhorn = Windows Longhorn (experimental)
* winNetBusiness = Windows 2003 Small Business Server
* winNetEnterprise = Windows 2003 Enterprise Server
* winNetStandard = Windows 2003 Server
* winNetWeb = Windows 2003 Web Server Edition
* winXPPro = Windows XP Professional Edition
* winXPHome = Windows XP Home Edition
* win2000AdvServ = Windows 2000 Advanced Server
* win2000Serv = Windows 2000 Server
* win2000Pro = Windows 2000 Professional
* winNT = Windows NT
* winMe = Windows Me
* win98 = Windows 98
* win95 = Windows 95
* win31 = Windows 3.1 / Windows 3.11
* windows = Other Windows
Microsoft Windows, 64-bit
* winVista-64 = Windows Vista x64 Edition (experimental)
* longhorn-64 = Windows Longhorn x64 Edition (experimental)
* winNetEnterprise-64 = Windows 2003 Enterprise Server x64 Edition
* winNetStandard-64 = Windows 2003 Server x64 Edition
* winXPPro-64 = Windows XP Professional x64 Edition
Linux, 32-bit
* ubuntu = Ubuntu Linux
* redhat = Red Hat Linux
* rhel4 = Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4
* rhel3 = Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3
* rhel2 = Red Hat Enterprise Linux 2
* suse = SuSE Linux
* sles = SuSE Linux Enterprise Server
* mandrake = Mandrake Linux
* nld9 = Novell Linux Desktop 9
* sjds = Sun Java Desktop System
* turbolinux = Turbo Linux
* other26xlinux = Other Linux on a 2.6.x kernel
* other24xlinux = Other Linux on a 2.4.x kernel
* linux = Other Linux
Linux, 64-bit
* ubuntu-64 = Ubuntu Linux 64-bit
* rhel4-64 = Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 64-bit
* rhel3-64 = Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3 64-bit
* sles-64 = SuSE Linux Enterprise Server 64-bit
* suse-64 = SuSE Linux 64-bit
* other26xlinux-64 = Other Linux 2.6.x 64-bit
* other24xlinux-64 = Other Linux 2.4.x 64-bit
* otherlinux-64 = Other Linux 64-bit
Sun Microsystems Solaris
* solaris10-64 = Solaris 10 64-bit
* solaris10 = Solaris 10
* solaris9 = Solaris 9
* solaris8 = Solaris 8
* solaris7 = Solaris 7
* solaris6 = Solaris 6
* solaris = Other Solaris
Novell Netware
* netware6 = Netware 6.x
* netware5 = Netware 5.x
* netware4 = Netware 4.x
* netware = Other Netware
FreeBSD
* freeBSD-64 = FreeBSD 64-bit
* freeBSD = FreeBSD
Apple Darwin
* darwin = Apple Darwin (unsupported)
Other
* other = Other OS
* other-64 = Other 64-bit OS
Finishing Touches
Example VMX
If you wanted to run the Ubuntu Linux 6.04 Dapper Drake Flight 3 preview release in a VMWare Player virtual machine, you should modify the first lines in the VMX file template to something like this:
#!/usr/bin/vmware
displayName = 'Ubuntu Dapper Drake 6.04 Flight 3'
guestOS = 'ubuntu'
memsize = '512'
scsi0:0.fileName = '20G.vmdk'
ide1:0.fileName = 'dapper-install-i386.iso'
After saving this file to 'dapper.vmx' you should run the VMWare Player:
vmplayer ./dapper.vmx
If all goes well, the installation CD ISO image will boot and you will be able to install Dapper Drake to the virtual hard disk. Enjoy!
Conclusion
Go create
With this tutorial you should now be able to create virtual machines from scratch. I hope I've provided you with all the tools necessary to create a blank disk and configuration and then enjoy the speed and easy of use of VMWare Player.
A word of advice though: if you like this VMWare product, please support VMWare by buying one of their software products. They deliver excellent value for money and will save you a lot of time otherwise spent on rebooting your computer system.
This article was written on the 14th of February 2006 and updated on the 7th of March 2006 fixing the LSI Logic SCSI adapter in the template file. On the 3rd of April 2006 I added the 20G IDE disk image for use with Windows XP. On the 23rd of October 2006 I added the VM template for use with Windows guest operating systems and added some comments on this.
On the 22nd of March 2009 I updated some outdated links to the QEMU website, thanks to Kevin Salmon informing me about these links.
Related pages
Check out these related pages on using VMWare Player:
* Installation on Ubuntu Linux
* QEMU website
* QEMU qemu-img documentation
* VMWare website
* VMWare Player website
* VMWare Server website
Other Linux articles
* Apache 2 mod_deflate Benchmark
* CGI Scripting Tips for Bash or SH
* GDB GNU Debugger Intro
* MySQL Tips and Tricks
* PostgreSQL Tips and Tricks
* Server-wide Performance Benchmarking
* Setting up a Chroot Jail for CVS
* VMWare Player Image Creation
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VMWare Player Image Creation
Introduction
Background
VMWare recently introduced their VMWare Player and VMWare Server products for Windows and Linux. They offer some premade disk images for use with the Player and Server technology, but they do not offer software to create new virtual machines or images. Luckily you can create them on your own without too much hassle.
I'm using VMWare Player under both Ubuntu Linux 5.04 Hoary Hedgehog and Ubuntu Linux 5.10 Breezy Badger. Installing the software is fairly straightforward and there are some great guides over at the Ubuntu forum on how to do this.
The trick to getting more out the VMWare Player and VMWare Server than a few premade images is actually two-fold, let me guide you through the process of almost getting a free VMWare Workstation replacement.
In this article I'll be referring mostly to VMWare Player, but you can also create VMWare Server images using the steps described.
A Fresh Start
Zero entropy
One of the 'problems' you could have with the premade images for VMWare Player is that they don't come in the sizes and formatting you'd like. Also, since they are already filled with data you don't really benefit from sparse file support from your filesystem once you format them from within the virtual machine.
The best thing to have would be a clean hard disk image in a reasonable size which you could use to format. If you start off with a nearly empty hard disk image, a filesystem like ext2 or ext3, will be able to detect the file as being sparse and optimize its usage accordingly.
There are two ways to get a clean disk image for your virtual machine.
Using QEMU
QEMU is an open source virtualization solution written by Fabrice Bellard. It supports a wide array of host operating systems and architectures and is able to virtualize a few different architectures as well. QEMU comes bundled with some tools related to virtualization and emulation.
In one of the more recent versions, a tool called qemu-img is included. Using this tool you can create empty disk images for use with QEMU, but also for use with VMWare products like VMWare Player. This tool can easily be installed on a Linux system.
But if you want to save some time, here's option two.
Download empty VMWare Player images
I've got some empty VMWare disk images available for download. They're compressed as ZIP files and because they are empty the files are very small. Uncompressing them on your own system will enable sparse files support, so don't worry once you start unpacking the larger disk images.
The empty disk images come in three sizes: 500 megabytes, 10 gigabytes and 20 gigabytes. I reckon these should be large enough for all but the most demanding users.
Download the empty VMWare Player disk images:
* VMWare Player SCSI disk image, 500 megabytes unpacked (.ZIP, 1 Kb)
* VMWare Player SCSI disk image, 10 gigabytes unpacked (.ZIP, 3 Kb)
* VMWare Player SCSI disk image, 20 gigabytes unpacked (.ZIP, 5 Kb)
* VMWare Player IDE disk image, 20 gigabytes unpacked (.ZIP, 5 Kb)
The disk images above are freely available on the Internet. Use the IDE disk image for installing Windows 2000, Windows XP or other Windows operating systems in your Player.
So, with the first barricade out of the way, let's look at the second problem: a so-called VMX file which contains the virtual machines description and properties.
Configuration Cleaning
Boilerplate
As I said earlier, you'll only need a VMWare Disk Image (a VMDK file) and a VMX file which describes the virtual machine. I've already presented you with three disk image downloads, and here is one file you can use as a template for your new virtual machines.
* VMWare Player Virtual Machine Template for Linux, BSD, UNIX and other guest operating systems (.VMX, 1 Kb)
* VMWare Player Virtual Machine Template for Windows operating systems (.VMX, 1 Kb)
If you are getting errors regarding a mismatch between the disk images using LSI Logic formatting and the template using a Bus Logic virtual SCSI device, please download the template again. I've updated it to use the correct LSI Logic SCSI device.
The second download link is the template you want to use with the IDE disk image to run Microsoft Windows inside the virtual machine. This second template uses an IDE disk which is compatible with Windows.
Customizing the template
Once you've downloaded the configuration file template, rename it to suit your needs and open it up in a text editor like vi, emacs or Notepad if you're using Windows. The first few lines are the ones above '# DEFAULT SETTINGS UNDER THIS LINE' and they look like this:
#!/usr/bin/vmware
displayName = 'Linux 2.6.x Host'
guestOS = 'other26xlinux'
memsize = '512'
scsi0:0.fileName = '10G.vmdk'
ide1:0.fileName = 'cdrom.iso'
The first line with the shebang can be ignored safely. The next few lines set a few options for the virtual machine, I'll explain these one by one.
* displayName defines the name of the virtual machine you will see in the titlebar and VMWare Player menu, you can use a long descriptive string if you want.
* guestOS is a short code for the operating system you will be running in the virtual machine. I have included a list of all possible values below.
* memsize defines the amount memory available to the virtual machine in megabytes. Valid entries are 32, 64, 128, 256, 512 and 1024.
* scsi0:0.fileName defines the hard disk image for the SCSI hard disk in the virtual machine. Use one of the downloads above to get the VMDK files.
* ide0:0.fileName defines the hard disk image for the IDE hard disk in the virtual machine. Use the IDE downloads above to get the VMDK file. This IDE disk allows you to run Microsoft Windows.
* ide1:0.fileName defines the ISO file to use in the CD-ROM drive of the virtual machine. The filename is relative to the working directory.
Needless to say, you should change the values in the template to suit your needs.
Supported Virtual Machine Operating Systems
One setting to rule them all
VMWare Player can be tweaked to perform better when virtualizing certain operating systems. Here is a list with all supported guest operating systems which you can enter in the guestOS parameter in the VMX configuration file.
Microsoft Windows, 32-bit
* winVista = Windows Vista (experimental)
* longhorn = Windows Longhorn (experimental)
* winNetBusiness = Windows 2003 Small Business Server
* winNetEnterprise = Windows 2003 Enterprise Server
* winNetStandard = Windows 2003 Server
* winNetWeb = Windows 2003 Web Server Edition
* winXPPro = Windows XP Professional Edition
* winXPHome = Windows XP Home Edition
* win2000AdvServ = Windows 2000 Advanced Server
* win2000Serv = Windows 2000 Server
* win2000Pro = Windows 2000 Professional
* winNT = Windows NT
* winMe = Windows Me
* win98 = Windows 98
* win95 = Windows 95
* win31 = Windows 3.1 / Windows 3.11
* windows = Other Windows
Microsoft Windows, 64-bit
* winVista-64 = Windows Vista x64 Edition (experimental)
* longhorn-64 = Windows Longhorn x64 Edition (experimental)
* winNetEnterprise-64 = Windows 2003 Enterprise Server x64 Edition
* winNetStandard-64 = Windows 2003 Server x64 Edition
* winXPPro-64 = Windows XP Professional x64 Edition
Linux, 32-bit
* ubuntu = Ubuntu Linux
* redhat = Red Hat Linux
* rhel4 = Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4
* rhel3 = Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3
* rhel2 = Red Hat Enterprise Linux 2
* suse = SuSE Linux
* sles = SuSE Linux Enterprise Server
* mandrake = Mandrake Linux
* nld9 = Novell Linux Desktop 9
* sjds = Sun Java Desktop System
* turbolinux = Turbo Linux
* other26xlinux = Other Linux on a 2.6.x kernel
* other24xlinux = Other Linux on a 2.4.x kernel
* linux = Other Linux
Linux, 64-bit
* ubuntu-64 = Ubuntu Linux 64-bit
* rhel4-64 = Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 64-bit
* rhel3-64 = Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3 64-bit
* sles-64 = SuSE Linux Enterprise Server 64-bit
* suse-64 = SuSE Linux 64-bit
* other26xlinux-64 = Other Linux 2.6.x 64-bit
* other24xlinux-64 = Other Linux 2.4.x 64-bit
* otherlinux-64 = Other Linux 64-bit
Sun Microsystems Solaris
* solaris10-64 = Solaris 10 64-bit
* solaris10 = Solaris 10
* solaris9 = Solaris 9
* solaris8 = Solaris 8
* solaris7 = Solaris 7
* solaris6 = Solaris 6
* solaris = Other Solaris
Novell Netware
* netware6 = Netware 6.x
* netware5 = Netware 5.x
* netware4 = Netware 4.x
* netware = Other Netware
FreeBSD
* freeBSD-64 = FreeBSD 64-bit
* freeBSD = FreeBSD
Apple Darwin
* darwin = Apple Darwin (unsupported)
Other
* other = Other OS
* other-64 = Other 64-bit OS
Finishing Touches
Example VMX
If you wanted to run the Ubuntu Linux 6.04 Dapper Drake Flight 3 preview release in a VMWare Player virtual machine, you should modify the first lines in the VMX file template to something like this:
#!/usr/bin/vmware
displayName = 'Ubuntu Dapper Drake 6.04 Flight 3'
guestOS = 'ubuntu'
memsize = '512'
scsi0:0.fileName = '20G.vmdk'
ide1:0.fileName = 'dapper-install-i386.iso'
After saving this file to 'dapper.vmx' you should run the VMWare Player:
vmplayer ./dapper.vmx
If all goes well, the installation CD ISO image will boot and you will be able to install Dapper Drake to the virtual hard disk. Enjoy!
Conclusion
Go create
With this tutorial you should now be able to create virtual machines from scratch. I hope I've provided you with all the tools necessary to create a blank disk and configuration and then enjoy the speed and easy of use of VMWare Player.
A word of advice though: if you like this VMWare product, please support VMWare by buying one of their software products. They deliver excellent value for money and will save you a lot of time otherwise spent on rebooting your computer system.
This article was written on the 14th of February 2006 and updated on the 7th of March 2006 fixing the LSI Logic SCSI adapter in the template file. On the 3rd of April 2006 I added the 20G IDE disk image for use with Windows XP. On the 23rd of October 2006 I added the VM template for use with Windows guest operating systems and added some comments on this.
On the 22nd of March 2009 I updated some outdated links to the QEMU website, thanks to Kevin Salmon informing me about these links.
Related pages
Check out these related pages on using VMWare Player:
* Installation on Ubuntu Linux
* QEMU website
* QEMU qemu-img documentation
* VMWare website
* VMWare Player website
* VMWare Server website
Other Linux articles
* Apache 2 mod_deflate Benchmark
* CGI Scripting Tips for Bash or SH
* GDB GNU Debugger Intro
* MySQL Tips and Tricks
* PostgreSQL Tips and Tricks
* Server-wide Performance Benchmarking
* Setting up a Chroot Jail for CVS
* VMWare Player Image Creation
Back to top
* ► Articles
* ► Linux
* ► VMWare Player Image Creation
Design and content © 1998 - 2010, Frank Schoep.
Powered by Fools Gold based on Website Baker.
Read the usability and accessibility statement.
- Sent using Google Toolbar"
EasyVMX!: Virtual Machine Creator
EasyVMX!: Virtual Machine Creator: "Create virtual machines for VMware Player
EasyVMX! is the simple and failsafe way to create complete virtual machines for VMware Player on the web.
You can install any Windows, Linux, BSD or Solaris, and test LiveCDs in a safe environment.
EasyVMX! has created 2,002,503 virtual machines.
"Absolutely the best online virtual machine builder"
Create virtual machines for VMware Player
EasyVMX! is the simple and failsafe way to create complete virtual machines for VMware Player on the web.
You can install any Windows, Linux, BSD or Solaris, and test LiveCDs in a safe environment.
EasyVMX! comes in three different flavours:
 |  |  |
| The original Virtual Machine Creator Four required configuration fields 500MB to 100GB pre-built disk images Lots of configuration options Download Virtual Machine as zip | Easiest Virtual Machine Creator ever Four required configuration fields Uses the default settings from EasyVMX! Great for Live CDs Download Virtual Machine as zip | EasyVMX! 2.0 (beta) Full Vista compatibility Supports Shared Folders Added lots of Player 2.0 features See all the new features in the blog |
EasyVMX! has created 2,002,503 virtual machines.
"Absolutely the best online virtual machine builder"
Zong Hopes to Offer One-Click Android Payments - Bits Blog - NYTimes.com
Zong Hopes to Offer One-Click Android Payments - Bits Blog - NYTimes.com: "Zong Hopes to Offer One-Click Android Payments
By NICK BILTON
Apple’s iAd platform, when it is first used this summer, will display embedded advertisements on mobile devices. Some ads could have the ability to complete transactions.
This move by Apple could please iPhone software developers who wish to offer free mobile applications and still draw revenue through the ad platform.
Zong mobile platformzong.com Zong’s latest mobile platform offers a one-click buy option.
But mobile transactions on the Google Android platform are currently limited to Google’s clunky Checkout system, which has curbed the ability to perform embedded mobile payments with Android apps.
To try and solve the difficult Android payment problem, Zong, a mobile payment company, announced on Wednesday that it planned to offer a solution to these limited options with a new embedded mobile payment product.
The new payment solution will make it easier for developers who design applications specifically for the Android platform to charge mobile customers and will make quick purchases possible without having to go through the painful process of entering credit-card numbers or billing information on a mobile phone.
Zong avoids this by using a process called carrier billing, where payments are billed directly to a user’s mobile phone provider.
Zong hopes to make it painless for developers to include the payment system in apps by providing a simple one-click button that can easily be slipped into any Android application. The program is currently being tested in a private test of the software.
David Marcus, Zong’s chief executive, explained in an interview by phone that the latest announcement made it simple to charge customers within an application.
“This could enable Zynga to build a mobile Farmville with virtual transactions built into the application with a few lines of code,” Mr. Marcus said.
He said he believed it could also help to make Android devices more popular than Apple iPhones and iPads. “The Android platform is going to surpass the iPhone in market share over the next five years,” he predicted.
Mr. Marcus also said the company planned to start with Android and explore other platforms at a later date. “We would love to be on the iPhone, but because of Apple’s terms of service we just can’t do in-app transactions,” he said.
According to a company press release, Zong currently processes millions of payments a month on mobile devices and with virtual goods online. The company recently closed a $15 million round of financing led by Matrix Partners.
The video below shows an example of a Zong transaction inside an Android game.
- Sent using Google Toolbar"
By NICK BILTON
Apple’s iAd platform, when it is first used this summer, will display embedded advertisements on mobile devices. Some ads could have the ability to complete transactions.
This move by Apple could please iPhone software developers who wish to offer free mobile applications and still draw revenue through the ad platform.
Zong mobile platformzong.com Zong’s latest mobile platform offers a one-click buy option.
But mobile transactions on the Google Android platform are currently limited to Google’s clunky Checkout system, which has curbed the ability to perform embedded mobile payments with Android apps.
To try and solve the difficult Android payment problem, Zong, a mobile payment company, announced on Wednesday that it planned to offer a solution to these limited options with a new embedded mobile payment product.
The new payment solution will make it easier for developers who design applications specifically for the Android platform to charge mobile customers and will make quick purchases possible without having to go through the painful process of entering credit-card numbers or billing information on a mobile phone.
Zong avoids this by using a process called carrier billing, where payments are billed directly to a user’s mobile phone provider.
Zong hopes to make it painless for developers to include the payment system in apps by providing a simple one-click button that can easily be slipped into any Android application. The program is currently being tested in a private test of the software.
David Marcus, Zong’s chief executive, explained in an interview by phone that the latest announcement made it simple to charge customers within an application.
“This could enable Zynga to build a mobile Farmville with virtual transactions built into the application with a few lines of code,” Mr. Marcus said.
He said he believed it could also help to make Android devices more popular than Apple iPhones and iPads. “The Android platform is going to surpass the iPhone in market share over the next five years,” he predicted.
Mr. Marcus also said the company planned to start with Android and explore other platforms at a later date. “We would love to be on the iPhone, but because of Apple’s terms of service we just can’t do in-app transactions,” he said.
According to a company press release, Zong currently processes millions of payments a month on mobile devices and with virtual goods online. The company recently closed a $15 million round of financing led by Matrix Partners.
The video below shows an example of a Zong transaction inside an Android game.
- Sent using Google Toolbar"
Zong Hopes to Offer One-Click Android Payments - Bits Blog - NYTimes.com
Zong Hopes to Offer One-Click Android Payments - Bits Blog - NYTimes.com: "Zong Hopes to Offer One-Click Android Payments
By NICK BILTON
Apple’s iAd platform, when it is first used this summer, will display embedded advertisements on mobile devices. Some ads could have the ability to complete transactions.
This move by Apple could please iPhone software developers who wish to offer free mobile applications and still draw revenue through the ad platform.
Zong mobile platformzong.com Zong’s latest mobile platform offers a one-click buy option.
But mobile transactions on the Google Android platform are currently limited to Google’s clunky Checkout system, which has curbed the ability to perform embedded mobile payments with Android apps.
To try and solve the difficult Android payment problem, Zong, a mobile payment company, announced on Wednesday that it planned to offer a solution to these limited options with a new embedded mobile payment product.
The new payment solution will make it easier for developers who design applications specifically for the Android platform to charge mobile customers and will make quick purchases possible without having to go through the painful process of entering credit-card numbers or billing information on a mobile phone.
Zong avoids this by using a process called carrier billing, where payments are billed directly to a user’s mobile phone provider.
Zong hopes to make it painless for developers to include the payment system in apps by providing a simple one-click button that can easily be slipped into any Android application. The program is currently being tested in a private test of the software.
David Marcus, Zong’s chief executive, explained in an interview by phone that the latest announcement made it simple to charge customers within an application.
“This could enable Zynga to build a mobile Farmville with virtual transactions built into the application with a few lines of code,” Mr. Marcus said.
He said he believed it could also help to make Android devices more popular than Apple iPhones and iPads. “The Android platform is going to surpass the iPhone in market share over the next five years,” he predicted.
Mr. Marcus also said the company planned to start with Android and explore other platforms at a later date. “We would love to be on the iPhone, but because of Apple’s terms of service we just can’t do in-app transactions,” he said.
According to a company press release, Zong currently processes millions of payments a month on mobile devices and with virtual goods online. The company recently closed a $15 million round of financing led by Matrix Partners.
The video below shows an example of a Zong transaction inside an Android game.
- Sent using Google Toolbar"
By NICK BILTON
Apple’s iAd platform, when it is first used this summer, will display embedded advertisements on mobile devices. Some ads could have the ability to complete transactions.
This move by Apple could please iPhone software developers who wish to offer free mobile applications and still draw revenue through the ad platform.
Zong mobile platformzong.com Zong’s latest mobile platform offers a one-click buy option.
But mobile transactions on the Google Android platform are currently limited to Google’s clunky Checkout system, which has curbed the ability to perform embedded mobile payments with Android apps.
To try and solve the difficult Android payment problem, Zong, a mobile payment company, announced on Wednesday that it planned to offer a solution to these limited options with a new embedded mobile payment product.
The new payment solution will make it easier for developers who design applications specifically for the Android platform to charge mobile customers and will make quick purchases possible without having to go through the painful process of entering credit-card numbers or billing information on a mobile phone.
Zong avoids this by using a process called carrier billing, where payments are billed directly to a user’s mobile phone provider.
Zong hopes to make it painless for developers to include the payment system in apps by providing a simple one-click button that can easily be slipped into any Android application. The program is currently being tested in a private test of the software.
David Marcus, Zong’s chief executive, explained in an interview by phone that the latest announcement made it simple to charge customers within an application.
“This could enable Zynga to build a mobile Farmville with virtual transactions built into the application with a few lines of code,” Mr. Marcus said.
He said he believed it could also help to make Android devices more popular than Apple iPhones and iPads. “The Android platform is going to surpass the iPhone in market share over the next five years,” he predicted.
Mr. Marcus also said the company planned to start with Android and explore other platforms at a later date. “We would love to be on the iPhone, but because of Apple’s terms of service we just can’t do in-app transactions,” he said.
According to a company press release, Zong currently processes millions of payments a month on mobile devices and with virtual goods online. The company recently closed a $15 million round of financing led by Matrix Partners.
The video below shows an example of a Zong transaction inside an Android game.
- Sent using Google Toolbar"
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