Sunday, November 15, 2009
psychobauble recently asked me what the dealbreaker was with my attempt to switch from VMware Fusion to Sun VirtualBox, and here's what I replied with: "I just kept running into too many small things that in Fusion it just works and in VirtualBox you could get it to work but only after a lot of extra work or you could spend 30 minutes seeking a solution only to find one doesn't exist. e.g., I couldn't get the resolution larger than 1600 x 1200 but my iMac supports 1920 x 1200 native. That alone wasn't a dealbreaker but then I had to figure out how to set up shared folders with OS X. That as well was not a dealbreaker by itself, but then something else didn't work like it should have (I forget exactly what that was now) and I just threw my hands up and said, "I should have just stuck with Fusion." Fortunately, I found upgrade education pricing for about $20 on VMware's website, but they don't make it very easy to find, and they don't make it easy to figure out if you qualify, especially if you're staff and not faculty. (I can provide more details if anyone is interested.) I felt that if VirtualBox had paid just a smidgen more attention to details it would have been an easy choice. VMware knew I was from a qualifying edu (based on my email address) and it knew I previously purchased a 5-pack of education licenses that were sold to a qualifying edu—they should have been able to tell me about the $20 education upgrade price. Instead, I was offered the normal $40 retail upgrade price. Unsuspecting education customers will just pay the $40 price without knowing any better. Essentially, VMware is saying, "you can receive special upgrade pricing but only if you know about it or if you can find where we have hidden it." I have encountered this kind of behavior from other vendors (e.g., sonic.net) and although it doesn't necessarily give me cause to find a new option it does cause me to view my relationship with that vendor as more tenuous than before. I realize that it's not necessarily intentional and could be a miscommunication amongst or poor judgment within internal departments or perhaps an outright lack of understanding the importance of the customer relationship. But whatever the source, the result to me is one of increasing mistrust." Usual oatmeal breakfast. Slept in. Walked in the Castro with Patrick. Chatted with Lori H and James J, encountered and said hello to Steaven C, met (partner?) Ken and dog Benny. Midafternoon meal at Thai Chef. Patrick got a gingerbread latte at Peet's, said hello to jonahsfo. Watched the sunset with Patrick at Twin Peaks. Watched Food, Inc. on Netflix DVD with Patrick. We've been eating vegetarian meals for several weeks now and seeing this new film reaffirms our decision. Sent this feedback to cleanscores today: "on the page at http://www.cleanscores.com/rest-226562-Feng-Shui-Restaurant-San-Francisco why if there are no violations does the restaurant receive only 3 stars instead of 5? also, what's up with the map? it shows Los Angeles instead of San Francisco."