"Bloomberg believe VMware's IPO today may the largest technology offering since Google. But doubts have been cast over the company's supposedly proprietary ESX product, which may be derived from Linux."
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Member since:2006-02-09
It's no secret that the ESX Service Console is based on RedHat 7.3 (at least ESX 2.x was). The service console just provides a means of starting and controlling the VM Kernel (which provides the hypervisor access and deals with the VM's). The "linux isn't grub" approach to the argument in the article seems odd. The Linux kernel brings some of the basic system stuff up and loads the VM kernel into kernel space. Isn't this more or less the equivalent of writing a "program" that runs in kernelspace instead of userspace?
I doubt that there is much true reliance on the Linux kernel specifically- VMWare could probably just as easily port vmkernel to BSD or Solaris (and I wonder if they might if they get too much crap just because they chose to use Linux!). The article actually states VMWare was developed on an old non-linux OS, but that it is unclear whether vmkernel was ported or written from scratch, so I guess that is why they are raising such a big stink? Although at some point isn't a complete rewrite when switching platforms just a very high-level port? (Still uses the concept but little/none of the original code) 
This all seems very silly. I guess VMWare has gone for too long with an awesome product that in some way involves the GPL not to be the target of FUD from someone, and what better time to sling the mud than near their IPO. Look out, Apple, you're next (OMG THEY USED GCC! GCC IS GPL'ed! The FSF is going to sue all Mac owners! Make sure you're safe by only using proprietary software because its legal status is never in question!) 
Member since:
2006-01-19
After you look at the installation and how similar it is from Redhat linux; have a look at "uname -a" for esx 3.0.(0,1,2) and you will see version 2.4.xx.ELxx
So linux derivative 100% with a lot of customization for performance
Truth is, it's unclear how it works. However, keep in mind that 'uname' is running on the service console, not the VMkernel. No one has ever suggested that the service console is not a direct (centos style) rip of RHEL3.