New
#1
How come this worked? Launch app from image.
I am wondering why something I did today worked and its implications.
I am in the middle of upgrading to a new PC so many of the apps I use on a regular basis are on my new Win 7 PC and some of my apps are on my old XP PC. I had removed most of the apps that had been installed on the new PC from the old one because a number of the apps I will need to run in the future will not run on the new OS so I created a VM of the old PC using VMware Convert. Since I wanted this VM to be as light as possible I removed all but the essential programs from the old PC which is where I am at now.
Today I was working on the old PC and discovered I needed an app that was no longer on it. I did not have access to the new PC but I did have access to an image I had made of it. I thought perhaps I would be able to find the install files for the app from the image rather than have to re-download them so I loaded the image as a virtual drive and went looking for them. Unfortunately (or fortunately) the install files were not there. I figured I had nothing to lose, so I navigated to the virtual drives program files folder in Windows Explorer, found the programs folder, and doubled clicked on the launch (exe) file for the app. Much to my surprise the app (Sony Sound Forge) launched without issue. I was able to use it, save my file to the real machines C drive, and then dismount the virtual drive without issue.
Why was I able to do this? I know the registration files and the installed program etc are part of the image but I did not think this would be sufficient to allow the program to launch as if it were currently installed on the old PC.
The implication here is that it may be possible to have VMs simply based on a drive image. No need for special software, no need to do PtoV using a program like VMware Convert, just mount an image as a drive, double click on any exe file for a particular program in that image, and away you go.
So why did this happen, why was I able to launch the app from the Virtual drive?
I look forward to your comments/thoughts on this.