A while back I wrote a post about how using VMs has made my life as a developer significantly easier. Two of the items on that list were things I hadn’t tried yet but just assumed were possible: loaning my VM with a co-worker if I was on vacation so they could continue work in my evironment and bringing my VM home on my portable harddrive instead of my laptop. But I wrote too soon (and I apologize for not testing that first!). When I finally decided to try out the VM at home, I ran into problems with Windows activation. And this issue would rule out the loaning to my co-worker scenario as well. Apparently VMs virtualize all of your “hardware” except for the processor in your host computer. Since the processor changed from my work computer to my home computer, it triggered the activation.
Now, for work, I have an MSDN license and could potentially get a volume license which would eliminate the re-activation, but I have several problems with that solution:
So I did some research and came up with an extremely cumbersome potential solution that was a variation on an activation file restoration procedure (which I won’t expand on since I was advised of legal repercussions) and asked in a VMWare forum if anyone had tried my solution or knew another workaround. Someone responded with a quote from the Windows EULA:
The term “COMPUTER” as used herein shall mean the HARDWARE, if
the HARDWARE is a single computer system, or shall mean the
computer system with which the HARDWARE operates, if the HARDWARE
is a computer system component.
…
you may install, use, access,
display and run only one (1) copy of the SOFTWARE on
the COMPUTER.
These statements above are contradictory as far as VMs are concerned. What is a COMPUTER really when you’re talking about a VM? It’s only because the processor is used by both the guest and the host that they might be considered a single COMPUTER. This leads me to think that VM use under normal circumstances is in violation of the EULA: if you’re running a VM with an installation of Windows on a Windows host, then you have two copies of the SOFTWARE running on the same COMPUTER. So is the VM a COMPUTER itself? I’ve seen many people ask “If I have a VM do I need a separate Windows license for the guest OS or can I use the host’s?”. And though I’ve seen different answers, they’re all basically either someone getting no official answer from Microsoft or someone saying that, yes, you do need a separate license, which indicates the VM is it’s own COMPUTER.
So you can’t have it both ways: that’s just not fair to consumers. It either is an independent COMPUTER or it’s not. If it is, then I should be able to use my licensed copy of Windows via a VM hosted wherever I want because the VM is a self-contained COMPUTER. If it’s not, then I only need one license to run a VM with Windows on a host of Windows since they’re both on the same COMPUTER and it still shouldn’t matter whether I used my VM on one or more COMPUTERs as long as each COMPUTER had a valid license for Windows.
To me, not being tied to your hardware is a major promise of Virtualization! Yeah, VMs are great for enterprise-level server resources allocation and for Q/A testing and for IT departments to deploy to workers as a replacement for PC images, but they have so much potential for consumer applications as well. Being able to wrap up things in a nice tidy package and have them accessible as long as there’s hardware close by that can run them is liberating and opens up so many possibilities.
But those possibilites and many more are currently eliminated by Windows activation.
TAD always tells me that I should write a letter to someone when I get upset about something, so this time I decided to take his advice. Here’s my request to Microsoft:
The time has arrived for Microsoft to come out with an official policy on licensing the Windows OS for use in VMs one way or the other. Either VMs are independent COMPUTERs or they are not and the licensing restrictions need to be fully defined for whichever situation is the case. Regardless of that decision, a way for the user to identify to the Windows installation that it is on a VM should be put in place. That being done:
Don’t deny the benefits of Virtualization to your customers! Please realize that your customers, who have paid you for their licenses, are not pirates and shouldn’t be treated as such. Demonstrate the respect you have for your customers by sheilding them from the inconvenience of the torture of having to endure hours on the phone trying to get someone help them unlock their copy of Windows that has been activated too many times for lack of foresight of this reasonable VM usage.
Thank you for your focus and efforts in resolving this issue.
Love, Your pal,
Lindsay
I solved this problem for someone recently and thought it might be useful to other people in the same situation.
There are several XSLT files, one with common functionality shared between all of the others which will be imported into the others. Particular templates in Common.xslt had parts that only needed to be activated if the Common.xslt was imported in specific “host” XSLTs. The problem is that there’s no way to know from Common.xslt whether it should do the special functionality because its unaware of it’s host.
This can be fixed by exploiting the template overriding property of <xsl:import>. You can create a template in Common.xslt that contains a value you may test for and override it in any of the host XSLT files that need to use that special functionality.
Common.xslt
<xsl:template name=“caller”>common</xsl:template>
<xsl:template name=“commontemplate”>
<xsl:variable name=“usespecial”><xsl:call-template name=“caller” /></xsl:variable>
<xsl:variable name=“whichtype”>
<xsl:choose>
<xsl:when test=“$usespecial = ’specialfunction’”>special</xsl:when>
<xsl:otherwise>normal</xsl:otherwise></xsl:choose>
</xsl:variable>
The main XSLT uses <xsl:value-of select=“$whichtype” /> functionality.
</xsl:template>
</xsl:stylesheet>
SpecialFunction.xslt
<xsl:template name=“caller”>specialfunction</xsl:template>
<xsl:template match=“/”>
<html><body><xsl:call-template name=“commontemplate” /></body></html>
</xsl:template>
</xsl:stylesheet>
Results:
NormalFunction.xslt
“caller” template is missing…
<xsl:template match=“/”>
<html><body><xsl:call-template name=“commontemplate” /></body></html>
</xsl:template>
</xsl:stylesheet>
Results:
You can modify this to make as many different types of special functionality as you need.
I find this quote from the Washington Post about the new Google Calendar pretty thought provoking:
With Google Maps, they were starting to control space, and here they are starting to control time.
Welcome to the Googleverse.
I love taking pictures and creating graphics. I can spend hours editing photos and crafting kaleidoscopes and other interesting things in Photoshop. I have super quality, top of the line (when I purchased it) Canon i9900 wideformat photo printer that I couldn’t have been more excited to bring home and play with. But after several attempts, it wasn’t long until I rarely printed any of my images.
Printing has always been a frustrating process. Pictures have always turned out too dark, too low-contrast or with horrible color casts. Getting a good print always meant a lot of test copies or strips while I tweaked levels or curves and held my breath as the print came out. It never looked like it did on my screen. I wasted way too much ink, paper and time trying everything from installing new printer drivers, screen calibration techniques, and untold combinations of printer settings and profiles. And I was always disappointed. Until yesterday.
I think I have finally figured out a way to make my prints come out reasonably close to what I see on my monitor and it’s a method that seems to work consistantly across different types of pictures with different color combinations. I wanted to share what I found since I’m sure I am not the only Canon I-Series printer owner who’s had the same types of frustrations and Canon doesn’t seem to offer much documentation or help on how to optimize your prints. Having said that, you still may have to do some tweaking (using my exact numbers may just get you in the ballpark) but the core of the “secret” should be easy to apply to your own prints.
Your image will probably look pretty washed out on your screen. This is to be expected.
| Screen without adjustment level | Screen with adjustment level |
 |
 |
When you print and compare it to your monitor, make sure that you turn off (click the eye) the printing adjustment layer. Your print should look like the “original” without that layer. If it’s close but not quite, tweak the numbers for midtone Input Levels on the Blue and Green channels. After a few times you should get a feel for what those numbers need to be.
This is not a perfect method, but so far it has taken about 90% of the guesswork and frustration out of printing for me. Again, I don’t know that it will work for other people, so please let me know if it does or doesn’t! And please, print out some SMALL tests before you waste a lot of paper and ink! Good luck!
Yay for Google! They’ve got another winner. I’ve been playing with GCal all morning and I’m pretty impressed. There’s still some room for improvement, of course, but Google has fixed one of my main peeves with 30Boxes: setting up repeating events and altering a single instance or the entire series is easy!
(put on your developer hat!)
Overall, it’s a great start and it’s going to be a lot of competition for some of the other options out there. Even with the issues I mentioned, I’m still pretty excited about what I’ve seen so far. I can’t wait to see what they do with it next.
I take lots of short video clips with the handy video feature of the camera I carry around in my purse, but never feel comfortable uploading the “raw” clips to YouTube, Vimeo, or the other service out there. I don’t have any video editing software on my PC mainly because I can’t justify the cost of the decent editors so if I want to polish anything I have to jump on my son’s iMac and use his iMovie app which, though very powerful, I don’t like using for two reasons: 1) in the most recent version, they have changed the output options so it’s extremely confusing to get the quality/filesize combination that I want and 2) any use of the Mac is a frustrating experience for me because I’m so completely PC indoctrinated that the supposed “intuitive GUI” of the Mac is not intuitive at all.
Enter Jumpcut. Mike Arrington and Pete Cashmore had reviews of this site last week and I thought I’d give it a try with a clip I shot yesterday at a RC Airshow that I attended with my family.
Overall, using Jumpcut to upload and edit the clip was a good experience, though I encountered a few usability issues, I was still able to add a couple of effects and some titles to my short clip of some RC aerobatics. Here are the pros and cons:
Despite the cons, I was able to register on the site, upload a clip, add a title and two effects and publish it in about an hour. I think now that I have the learning curve down, I should be able to do the same thing in about 15 minutes or so. That’s about the right amount of effort that I’m confortable with for publishing clips to the web. Jumpcut certainly isn’t a tool to produce professional quality video, but for the purpose of polishing and remixing some less-than-professional clips from my small camera or phone with the intention of quickly and easily sharing them with friends, family and blog visitors, the service fits my needs pretty well. I think I see more video in my future!
Bonus: Here are a couple of other videos on Jumpcut I thought were creative:
Save the Peeps!
Box-Car Racers
