VMware is a virtualization and cloud computing software vendor based in Palo Alto, California. Founded in 1998, VMware is now a subsidiary of Dell Technologies. VMware bases its virtualization technologies on its bare-metal hypervisor ESX/ESXi in x86 architecture. Bare-metal embedded hypervisors can run directly on a server’s hardware without the need of a primary operating system. With VMware server virtualization, a hypervisor is installed on the physical server to allow for multiple virtual machines (VMs) to run on the same physical server. Each VM can run its own operating system, allowing multiple OSes to run on one physical server. All of the VMs on the same physical server share resources, such as networking and RAM.
VMware products include virtualization, networking and security management tools, software-defined data center software, and storage software. VMware vSphere is a server virtualization platform for implementing and managing VM infrastructures on a large scale. VMware vSphere, also referred to as a cloud operating system or a virtualized data center platform, enables IT departments to place application workloads on the most cost-effective compute resource available.
VMware offers applications for desktops as well as servers. VMware’s desktop software is compatible with Linux, Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X. Desktop products include VMware Workstation, VMware Fusion and VMware Player. VMware’s line of server software includes VMware ESX Server, VMware ESXi Server and VMware Server. VMware has been a SUSE Alliance Partner since 2004, supporting Linux on VMware software, on premises or in the cloud. In addition to providing a reliable data center virtualization solution, SUSE and VMware have collaborated to provide cloud solutions for both private clouds and public clouds. SUSE Linux Enterprise Server is certified and supported on the latest vSphere release.