VMware

This article is about installing VMware in Arch Linux; you may also be interested in VMware/Installing Arch as a guest.

Note:
  • This article is about the latest major VMware versions, meaning VMware Workstation 11 and VMware Player (Pro) 7.
  • For older versions, use the vmware-patchAUR package.

Installation

Install the correct dependencies:

  • fuse - the vmware-vmblock-fuse service is favored over the vmblock module, which is not built anymore without disabling fuse in the kernel
  • gtkmm - for the GUI
  • linux-headers - for module compilation

Download the latest VMware Workstation or VMware Player (Pro) (or a beta version, if available).

Start the installation (--eulas-agreed skips the EULAs):

# sh VMware-edition-version.release.architecture.bundle --eulas-agreed
Tip: Some other useful flags:
  • --console - Use the console UI.
  • -I, --ignore-errors - Ignore fatal errors.
  • --set-setting vmware-workstation serialNumber XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX - Set the serial number during install (good for scripted installs).
  • --required - Only ask mandatory questions (results in silent install when combined with --eulas-agreed and --console).

For the System service scripts directory, use /etc/init.d (the default).

Note: During the installation you will get an error about "No rc*.d style init script directories" being given. This can be safely ignored, since Arch uses systemd.
Tip: To (re)build the modules from terminal later on, use:
# vmware-modconfig --console --install-all

Configuration

Tip: There is also a package called vmware-patchAUR with the intention of trying to automate this section (it also supports older VMware versions).

Preventing crashes and freezes when checking for updates

curl 7.42 depeds on openssl>=1.0.2. VMware prefers the system Curl, but uses its own version of OpenSSL (1.0.1). To make VMware use its own version of Curl as well, add:

   export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/usr/lib/vmware/lib/libcurl.so.4

before the following line from the end of the file:

   exec "$libdir"/bin/"name of script" "$@"

in /usr/bin/vmware and/or /usr/bin/vmplayer.

VMware module patches and installation

Note: Due to Workstation 11/Player (Pro) 7 taking advantage of the mainlined kernel modules, patching the VMCI/VSOCK sources is no longer required.

VMware Workstation 11.1.0 and Player (Pro) 7.1.0 support kernels up to 3.18.

3.19 kernels and up

Since 3.19 kernel the vmnet module will fail to build.

A patch is available at [1]:

$ curl http://pastie.org/pastes/9934018/download -o /tmp/vmnet-3.19.patch

Extract the vmnet module sources:

$ cd /usr/lib/vmware/modules/source
# tar -xf vmnet.tar

Apply the patch:

# patch -p0 -i /tmp/vmnet-3.19.patch

Recreate the archive:

# tar -cf vmnet.tar vmnet-only

Remove leftover:

# rm -r *-only

Rebuild modules:

# vmware-modconfig --console --install-all

systemd services

(Optional) Instead of using /etc/init.d/vmware (start|stop|status|restart) and /usr/bin/vmware-usbarbitrator directly to manage the services, you may also use .service files (also available in the AUR as vmware-systemd-servicesAUR):

/etc/systemd/system/vmware.service
[Unit]
Description=VMware daemon
Requires=vmware-usbarbitrator.service
Before=vmware-usbarbitrator.service
After=network.target

[Service]
ExecStart=/etc/init.d/vmware start
ExecStop=/etc/init.d/vmware stop
PIDFile=/var/lock/subsys/vmware
RemainAfterExit=yes

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target
/etc/systemd/system/vmware-usbarbitrator.service
[Unit]
Description=VMware USB Arbitrator
Requires=vmware.service
After=vmware.service

[Service]
ExecStart=/usr/bin/vmware-usbarbitrator
ExecStop=/usr/bin/vmware-usbarbitrator --kill
RemainAfterExit=yes

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

After which you can enable them on boot.

Launching the application

To open VMware Workstation:

$ vmware

or VMware Player (Pro):

$ vmplayer

Tips and tricks

Entering the Workstation License Key

From terminal

# /usr/lib/vmware/bin/vmware-vmx-debug --new-sn XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX

Where XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX is your license key.

Note: The -debug binary informs the user of an incorrect license.

From GUI

If the above does not work, you can try:

# /usr/lib/vmware/bin/vmware-enter-serial

Extracting the VMware BIOS

$ objcopy /usr/lib/vmware/bin/vmware-vmx -O binary -j bios440 --set-section-flags bios440=a bios440.rom.Z
$ perl -e 'use Compress::Zlib; my $v; read STDIN, $v, '$(stat -c%s "./bios440.rom.Z")'; $v = uncompress($v); print $v;' < bios440.rom.Z > bios440.rom

Extracting the installer

To view the contents of the installer .bundle:

$ sh VMware-edition-version.release.architecture.bundle --extract /tmp/vmware-bundle/

Using the modified BIOS

If and when you decide to modify the extracted BIOS you can make your virtual machine use it by moving it to ~/vmware/Virtual_machine_name:

$ mv bios440.rom ~/vmware/Virtual_machine_name/

then adding the name to the Virtual_machine_name.vmx file:

~/vmware/Virtual_machine_name/Virtual_machine_name.vmx
bios440.filename = "bios440.rom"

Using DKMS to manage the modules

Tango-dialog-warning.png

Tango-dialog-warning.png

This article or section is out of date.

Reason: Using DKMS like described below might not work, or this is not the only valid/working solution. There are several packages in the AUR, like vmware-modules-dkmsAUR. (Discuss in Talk:VMware#)

The Dynamic Kernel Module Support (DKMS) can be used to manage Workstation modules and to void from re-running vmware-modconfig each time the kernel changes. The following example uses a custom Makefile to compile and install the modules through vmware-modconfig. Afterwards they are removed from the current kernel tree.

Preparation

First, install the dkms package.

Then create a source directory for the Makefile and the dkms.conf:

# mkdir /usr/src/vmware-modules-11/

Build configuration

Fetch the files with git or use the ones below.

1) Using Git
$ cd /tmp
$ git clone git://github.com/bawaaaaah/dkms-workstation.git
$ sed -i 's/9/11/' dkms-workstation/dkms.conf
# cp dkms-workstation/Makefile dkms-workstation/dkms.conf /usr/src/vmware-modules-11/
2) Manual setup

The dkms.conf describes the module names and the compilation/installation procedure. AUTOINSTALL="yes" tells the modules to be recompiled/installed automatically each time:

/usr/src/vmware-modules-11/dkms.conf
PACKAGE_NAME="vmware-modules"
PACKAGE_VERSION="11"

MAKE[0]="make all"
CLEAN="make clean"

BUILT_MODULE_NAME[0]="vmmon"
BUILT_MODULE_LOCATION[0]="modules"

BUILT_MODULE_NAME[1]="vmnet"
BUILT_MODULE_LOCATION[1]="modules"

BUILT_MODULE_NAME[2]="vmblock"
BUILT_MODULE_LOCATION[2]="modules"

BUILT_MODULE_NAME[3]="vmci"
BUILT_MODULE_LOCATION[3]="modules"

BUILT_MODULE_NAME[4]="vsock"
BUILT_MODULE_LOCATION[4]="modules"

DEST_MODULE_LOCATION[0]="/extra/vmware"
DEST_MODULE_LOCATION[1]="/extra/vmware"
DEST_MODULE_LOCATION[2]="/extra/vmware"
DEST_MODULE_LOCATION[3]="/extra/vmware"
DEST_MODULE_LOCATION[4]="/extra/vmware"

AUTOINSTALL="yes"

and now the Makefile:

/usr/src/vmware-modules-11/Makefile
KERNEL := $(KERNELRELEASE)
HEADERS := /usr/lib/modules/$(KERNEL)/build/include
GCC := $(shell vmware-modconfig --console --get-gcc)
DEST := /lib/modules/$(KERNEL)/vmware

TARGETS := vmmon vmnet vmblock vmci vsock

LOCAL_MODULES := $(addsuffix .ko, $(TARGETS))

all: $(LOCAL_MODULES)
	mkdir -p modules/
	mv *.ko modules/
	rm -rf $(DEST)
	depmod

$(HEADERS)/linux/version.h:
	ln -s $(HEADERS)/generated/uapi/linux/version.h $(HEADERS)/linux/version.h

%.ko: $(HEADERS)/linux/version.h
	vmware-modconfig --console --build-mod -k $(KERNEL) $* $(GCC) $(HEADERS) vmware/
	cp -f $(DEST)/$@ .

clean: rm -rf modules/

Installation

The modules can then be installed with:

# dkms install vmware-modules/11 -k $(uname -r)

Enable 3D graphics on Intel and Optimus

Some graphics drivers are blacklisted by default, due to poor and/or unstable 3D acceleration. After enabling Accelerate 3D graphics, the log may show something like:

Disabling 3D on this host due to presence of Mesa DRI driver.  Set mks.gl.allowBlacklistedDrivers = TRUE to override.

This means the following:

~/.vmware/preferences
mks.gl.allowBlacklistedDrivers = TRUE

Troubleshooting

/dev/vmmon not found

The full error is:

Could not open /dev/vmmon: No such file or directory.
Please make sure that the kernel module `vmmon' is loaded.

This means that at least the vmmon module is not loaded. See the #systemd services section for automatic loading.

Kernel headers for version 4.x-xxxx were not found. If you installed them[...]

Install the headers (linux-headers).

Note: Upgrading the kernel and the headers will require you to boot to the new kernel to match the version of the headers. This is a relatively common error.

USB devices not recognized

Tip: Also handled by vmware-patchAUR.

If not using the systemd service to automatically handle the services, you need to manually start the vmware-usbarbitrator binary as root each time.

To start:

# vmware-usbarbitrator

To stop:

# vmware-usbarbitrator --kill

The installer fails to start

If you just get back to the prompt when opening the .bundle, then you probably have a deprecated or broken version of the VMware installer and it should removed (you may also refer to the uninstallation section of this article):

# rm -r /etc/vmware-installer/

Unable to download VMware Tools for Guests

If after #Preventing crashes and freezes when checking for updates you are still unable to download the VMware Tools ISOs, you may either try running vmware or vmplayer as root, or downloading them directly from the VMware repository.

Navigate to: "application name / version / build ID / linux / packages/" and download the appropriate Tools.

Extract with:

$ tar -xvf vmware-tools-name-version-buildID.x86_64.component.tar

And install using the VMware installer:

# vmware-installer --install-component=/path/vmware-tools-name-version-buildID.x86_64.component

Incorrect login/password when trying to access VMware remotely

VMware Workstation provides the possibility to remotely manage Shared VMs through the vmware-workstation-server service. However, this will fail with the error "incorrect username/password" due to incorrect PAM configuration of the vmware-authd service. To fix it, edit /etc/pam.d/vmware-authd like this:

/etc/pam.d/vmware-authd
#%PAM-1.0
auth     required       pam_unix.so
account  required       pam_unix.so
password required       pam_permit.so
session  required       pam_unix.so

and restart the vmware systemd service.

Now you can connect to the server with the credentials provided during the installation.

Note: libxslt may be required for starting virtual machines.

Issues with ALSA output

To fix sound quality issues or enabling proper HD audio output, first run:

$ aplay -L

If interested in playing 5.1 surround sound from the guest, look for surround51:CARD=vendor_name,DEV=num, if experiencing quality issues, look for front:CARD=vendor_name,DEV=num. Finally put the name in the .vmx:

~/vmware/Virtual_machine_name/Virtual_machine_name.vmx
sound.fileName="surround51:CARD=Live,DEV=0"
sound.autodetect="FALSE"

OSS emulation should also be disabled.

Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) is running

To disable KVM on boot, you can use something like:

/etc/modprobe.d/vmware.conf
blacklist kvm
blacklist kvm-amd   # For AMD CPUs
blacklist kvm-intel # For Intel CPUs

Segmentation fault at startup due to old Intel microcode

Old Intel microcode may result in the following kind of segmentation fault at startup:

/usr/bin/vmware: line 31: 4941 Segmentation fault "$BINDIR"/vmware-modconfig --appname="VMware Workstation" --icon="vmware-workstation"

Install intel-ucode and make /boot/intel-ucode.img to be loaded by the bootloader.

See Microcode for more information.

Guests have incorrect system clocks or are unable to boot: "[...]timeTracker_user.c:234 bugNr=148722"

This is due to incomplete support of power management features (Intel SpeedStep and AMD PowerNow!/Cool'n'Quiet) in VMware Linux that vary the CPU frequency. In March 2012, with the release of linux 3.3-1 the maximum frequency Performance governor was replaced with the dynamic Ondemand. When the host CPU frequency changes, the Guest system clock runs too quickly or too slowly, but may also render the whole Guest unbootable.

To prevent this, the maximum host CPU frequency can be specified, and Time Stamp Counter (TSC) disabled, in the global configuration:

/etc/vmware/config
host.cpukHz = "X"  # The maximum speed in KHz, e.g. 3GHz is "3000000".
host.noTSC = "TRUE" # Keep the Guest system clock accurate even when
ptsc.noTSC = "TRUE" # the time stamp counter (TSC) is slow.
Tip: To periodically correct the time (once per minute), in the Options tab of VMware Tools, enable: "Time synchronization between the virtual machine and the host operating system".

Networking on Guests not available after system restart

This is likely due to the vmnet module not being loaded [2]. See also the #systemd services section for automatic loading.

Uninstallation

To uninstall VMware you need the product name (either vmware-workstation or vmware-player). To list all the installed products:

$ vmware-installer -l

and uninstall with (--required skips the confirmation):

# vmware-installer -u product --required
Tip: Use --console for the console UI.

Remember to also disable and remove the services:

# rm /etc/systemd/system/vmware.service
# rm /etc/systemd/system/vmware-usbarbitrator.service

You may also want to have a look at the module directories in /usr/lib/modules/kernel_name/misc/ for any leftovers.