The video above and the article below compare two free virtual machine applications designed for home users: Microsoft Virtual PC and Sun VirtualBox.

What is a Virtual Machine (VM)?

A virtual machine (VM) is a computer that runs inside a window on your host computer. VMs are also great for testing–you can test different operating systems, applications, and configurations without messing up your computer. For example, you could run Windows in a VM on a Linux or Macintosh computer, allowing you to run Windows-only applications. Or, you could test out Linux in a VM on your Windows box without committing to it.

In fact, even if you install spyware, adware, or rootkits in a VM, they won’t infect your host computer. Just shut down the VM, and your computer is as clean as ever. VMs are also a great tool for learning networking, allowing you to connect several different computers when you only have one computer available.

After the jump, my recommendations for home users who want to use VMs:

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I’ve always thought Windows guys should put more time into learning scripting. That’s always been one of the big advantages of UNIX–the platform has had an incredible scripting infrastructure, and UNIX admins always knew how to create scripts to automate their work.

Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, and especially Windows Vista have greatly improved scripting. Now, you can do almost anything from the command-line or a script. Windows PowerShell takes those capabilities to the next level. If you’re in IT, I highly recommend reading up on it–you’ll save yourself time in the long run. If you have development or scripting experience, it’ll be that much easier to learn. If you don’t, it’s still very much worth your time.

Download the 32-bit version here, and the 64-bit version here. Also, check out the Windows PowerShell blog.

Question:

Tony,

I know you likely get a lot of email, however I just have a quick question.  In one of your pages you mention X-10 sending email in case basement floods.  Do you know where I can obtain an X-10 moisture sensor?  I think I can code everything else to send the text message to my cell.  Great job on your videos.  I’m a fan!

TIA!

Answer:

Yep, check out this water sensor. You’ll also need an X10 PowerFlash module to connect it to. The water sensor just throws a relay, the PowerFlash module does the work of sending the X10 signal.

If you like those sidebar gadgets and you have any interest in development, check out OdeToCode’s article on developing gadgets for Windows Sidebar. Scott gives you an overview of the gadget platform and gets you started down the path of making your own gadget. I haven’t gotten around to making my own yet, but I’m very interested in it–looks like a fun way to develop. Let me know if you do something interesting with it.

As you may have noticed, I love .NET. My nerd friends love it, too. That’s why I was surprised the other day when one of them asked me what .NET 3.0 was.

It would be reasonable to assume that .NET 3.0 provides a similar upgrade that .NET 1.0 to .NET 2.0 did. It’s not, though. Whereas .NET 2.0 changed a lot of existing aspects of .NET 1.0, .NET 3.0 mostly adds classes. Plus, they’re mostly presentation and gaming classes, so Web and business developers probably won’t be that interested. Hopefully, since it’s built into Vista, we’ll see more and more audio, video, and gaming apps built using the .NET Framework.
While reading Marc’s blog I found a link to Rob Eisenberg’s site, where he provides a very useful multi-part crash course for .NET 3.0. Looks like a great place to start. Also check out the video over at ContentPresenter.com (you’ll have to jump through some hoops–it’s a zipped download that requires a special codec).

Notes from a dark corner : Using Visual Studio 2005 on Vista for web development gives guidance on getting Visual Studio 2005 up and running on Vista. It sounds like Doug has been struggling with this some. I’ve done Visual Studio 2003 with ASP.NET 1.1 to an external Web server with no minimal problems, and Visual Studio 2005 with .NET 2.0 Windows Forms applications with no problems, but I haven’t had a reason to do Visual Studio 2005 for Web apps on Vista yet.

Question:

Hi Tony,

I have been reading you vista clues and I appreciate the help.

Is there a way to run a batch file on vista to set the “Run as administrator” on an exe.

We have a exe that is delivered to our customers monthly. The exe writes files and expects them to be were we installed the product. Of course, with vista this is not true. I can fix this problem but setting the Run as administrator.

The applications are built under XP so I can not set this property before I packages, so what I was thinking was as part of my install/update

Install the exe on vista and then run a batch program to set it as run as administrator. I can not have the customer do this manually.

Do you think this will work? Do you know how to do this?

Any help would be appreciated.

Thank you

Answer:

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