One of my pet peeves is that each virtual appliance coming out of
VMware is that each different virtual appliance released by them is
based on a different OS. Some of these do not even have documented
methods for updating the OS. We all know that no matter what OS is
running on a system, there will be updates for stability and security.
Almost every time I begin an engagement with a customer and it involves
using a virtual appliance, their security wonks get all pissy with me
and I need to show that I have the latest security patches installed
before I even connect the appliance to their network.

This all started with the HealthCheck Appliance, which is a tool
available to partners. Its running Ubuntu 7.10 Server JEOS. Great! It
is an unsupported, deprecated OS. If you know anything about Ubuntu,
you know that the “Long Term Support” (LTS) versions are released every
other year. So, the latest LTS version is 8.04 and the previous is
6.06. No big deal, right?

Read more…
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