Virtual Machine Streaming? I had never heard of it before. What is it? According to VMware, it is about downloading a virtual machine from a Web server and powering it on without waiting for the download to complete. You can use the command-line startup command (vmware for Workstation or vmplayer for VMware Player) with the URL of the virtual machine. The download can also be paused and restarted. So it sounds a lot more than it is but still rather cool and, yet again, very innovative.

There are a lot more new features in Beta 2 of VMware Workstation 6.5 including:

• Installer bundle for Linux hosts — Installing Workstation on Linux hosts just got a lot easier. The new bundle format provides a graphical UI wizard for most Linux operating systems. With a few mouse clicks, Workstation is installed. For users who want a custom installation, a command-line interface provides complete control.
  
• (Experimental) Record/replay debugging — Record the execution of an application you want to debug and then use the Visual Studio Integrated Virtual Debugger to examine the recording repeatedly. No debugging is performed during the recording process, so debugging activities do not affect the normal execution of an application. This powerful tool enables you to fix bugs that cannot be reliably reproduced. For the most up-to-date documentation on this feature, see Appendix C of the Workstation User's Manual.
  
• Unity mode enhancements — You can now drag and drop files between the host and Linux guests that are in Unity mode. You can also copy and paste text with Linux guests. Previously these features were available only for Windows guests.
  
• Text copy and paste enhancements — On Windows guests, you can copy and paste text in rich text format, and copy up to 4MB of text. (On Linux guests, the old limitations still apply. You can copy and paste up to 64K of plain text.)
  
• VMCI Sockets interface — Developers who want to write client-server applications for virtual machines can now use this sockets interface for the Virtual Machine Communication Interface. VMCI provides a faster means of communication among applications running on the host and in virtual machines. See the VMCI Sockets Programming Guide.
  
• vmrun enhancements — Many command-line options have been added to this command-line interface for operating virtual machines. See Using vmrun to Control Virtual Machines.