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Big VMware Bug Action

Some VMware ESX 3.5 users got a scary surprise recently: Virtual machines that were shut down wouldn't power back up. The culprit? A flaw in VMware's licensing module where the licensing code is under the assumption that you no longer have the right to run the software. These licenses expired this Tuesday, Aug. 12, whether you were paid up or not.

New CEO Paul Maritz personally apologized to customers in a letter released this week. VMware has some "express patches" for the flaw, and advises shops that downloaded the ESX 3.5 Update 2 patch -- but haven't installed it yet -- to hold off.

Posted by Doug Barney on August 14, 2008


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