Much of what I do revolves around Email, or at least is at some point recorded in Email.  Just about every day I process email that has entered my inbox both at home and at work. And just about every day I’m reminded what an Email pack rat I am.  I keep all Email, or at least I attempt to.  Yeah, I’m kinda that guy who sometimes uses email as a file server.  At one point I was so bad, I used to keep SPAM messages as well but fortunately I came to the realization that:

1. I had gone too far and was one step away from being clinically insane.
2. As my volume of mail to process grew, including SPAM, I honestly never had any intention to go back and read SPAM, not even from a humor or posterity point of view.

So tonight I’m processing some items in my inbox at home.  In the back of my mind, I’m again reminded of the fact that I’ve got loads of old mail saved in my .PST file.  As a result, my curiosity suggests taking a break and locating the oldest piece of Email.  Since I have several folder catagories for Email I receive and in the interest of time, I decide not to bother searching each folder containing Email I which I have received.  The best bang for the buck here is to choose the folder which contains sent items, and then choose the oldest piece of Email based on sent date.  Who did I write to?  What was the subject?  When did I send it?

Would you believe this?

The oldest recorded Email in my possession was sent in August 2003 to my friend Dawn in California, with the subject of VMWARE.  Well, I’ve provided the screenshot above; you can read it for yourself. 

I couldn’t have staged the results any better.  I guess this constitutes my first recorded act of VMware evangelism.  Mind you, it’s about a year before my account creation and first post on the VMTN forums, and two years before I started using ESX, sat the ICM class, and became VCP 2712 on VI2.  There had never been a VMworld yet, and John Troyer was still a self employed consultant in the computer software industry (I would later meet John for the first time in 2006 at a bar in Los Angeles, but I digress).  In this particular point in time I’m still using VMware Workstation and probably experimenting with VMware GSX in the lab and formulating a plan for using GSX at the DR/BCP recovery site.

In case you’re curious, I received a reply from Dawn less than an hour afterwards:

You have told me about it and we have it here at work. If I ever add another machine at hole I’ll get it from you, but I don’t see that happening too soon, I just don’t have room for more computers…

Dawn

To which I replied five minutes later:

With VMWARE, you add more virtual computers on your existing machine. It doesn’t mean you have to go buy more computers. That’s what VMWARE is all about, doing more with what you have. Only thing is that the computer you run you VMs on should have lots of memory and hopefully a decent CPU (P3 or better)

Jas

If I get real ambitious, I could add a second post to this later where I mount my .PST files from my previous job which go back to 1998.  Sometime in the 2000/2001 timeframe is when I was introduced to VMware by a former co-worker Paul.  Some of my earliest conversations could be great fun to look at.  I remember having extreme curiosity about how this VMware could possibly work.  In addition, I was totally nervous about installing Windows as a VM as I thought it would wipe out the boot record on my workstation.

And there you have it.  A little history about VMware and my early beginnings with it.  I’m sure everyone has a story to tell.  I’d like to hear yours in the comments below.

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