Date: Sun, 22 Jul 2007 11:26:55 -0400 From: John Nielsen <lists@jnielsen.net> To: freebsd-emulation@freebsd.org Cc: Makoto Matsushita <matusita@jp.freebsd.org>, Mark Linimon <linimon@lonesome.com> Subject: Re: are the vmware3* ports still needed? Message-ID: <200707221126.57742.lists@jnielsen.net> In-Reply-To: <46A336F6.6040103@jp.FreeBSD.org> References: <20070722061625.GD4336@soaustin.net> <46A336F6.6040103@jp.FreeBSD.org>
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On Sunday 22 July 2007, Makoto Matsushita wrote:
> (put my "emulations/vmware-{tools,guestd}3 MAINTAINER" hat on)
>
> > These ports depends on misc/compat3x, which has long-known security
> > problems. Is there any reason to keep the vmware3* ports around now?
>
> Maybe no reason to keep them (except for users who still use VMware
> Workstation 3, already unsupported product by VMware.) However, there's
> less reason to remove them and that's why these ports still there.
>
> Since misc/compat3x security vulnerability is hard to fix, it's the time
> to remove emulations/vmware-{tools,guestd}3.
Unfortunately, VMware Workstation 3.x is the most recent Workstation that
works (or sort of works, or used to work) on FreeBSD. Definitely not
supported by VMware any longer and in fact impossible to get licenses for,
but I know that there are people still using it.
There have been various threads in the past few months about what needs to
happen to get recent versions of VMware Server or Workstation working under
FreeBSD. Most notably, rsync.net is sponsoring a code bounty to get VMware
Workstation 5.5 (or possibly 6.0 now) working under FreeBSD (this went out
on -announce). The bounty page is below. Although it hasn't been updated, I
believe the bounty _has_ been claimed (and I actually sent a Workstation 6
license key that I'm not using to rsync.net to aid the process) and is now
being worked on. I don't have any more details than that, however.
http://www.rsync.net/resources/notices/2007cb.html
Anyway, I think that the emulators/vmware3 port should remain at least until
a usable replacement appears. If there _is_ a compelling argument to axe
it, a heads-up should probably go to a wider audience than -emulation,
possibly including one or more of -ports, -questions and -stable.
JN
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