Software Developers May Face a Testing Challenge When Developing for Vista

Companies that plan on developing software for the upcoming Windows Vista Operating System may find they need a few more PCs (and a few more licenses for Vista) to make sure their software works properly.

Most software development companies use virtual machines for software testing – a single computer that can simultaneously run multiple operating systems. For example, it is a lot easier to make sure a new program will work well in Windows XP Professional and Windows XP Media Center Edition if you can run both operating systems on one computer at the same time and switch between them in real time.

But there is a glitch in the licensing for Windows Vista that may aggravate software developers who currently enjoy having one test machine that can test a program on all operating systems simultaneously. Microsoft is only allowing Vista Ultimate and Vista Business Editions to run in a virtual machine. The other three versions of Vista will not run in a virtual machine and therefore must be installed on independent computers. So to completely test your software on all 5 versions of Vista, you will need 4 computers – one virtual machine for Vista Business and Vista Ultimate and three others – one for each lesser version of Vista.

Microsoft claims this is a needed step to preserve their intellectual property and suppress software theft, but some in the development community have voiced strong opposition to the change.