VMware Tools are an optional set of drivers and utilities that can greatly improve the speed, efficiency and manageability of the virtual machine’s guest operating system. These tools allow cut and paste, mouse and clock synchronization, folder sharing across environments and several other key benefits.
This tutorial has been tested on Debian Squeeze running on VMware Workstation 8. The following steps should work on all the latest versions of Debian and VMware Workstation/Player.
1. In an X session, launch a Terminal and switch to root user.
$ su - Password:
2. Update your system.
# apt-get update
3. Install kernel headers and tools required to compile and install VMware Tools.
# apt-get install make gcc linux-headers-$(uname -r)
4. Mount the VMware Tools virtual CD.
In VMware Workstation menu, click VM then select Install VMware Tools… menu item. This will put a VMware Tools CD icon on the desktop and a File Browser window should be opened immediately.
If the file browser doesn’t open or it is empty, then in the VMware Workstation menu, click VM, choose Cancel VMware Tools Installation, accept if asked to disconnect the CD-ROM and try again this step.
5. Extract VMware Tools to the tmp directory.
# cd /media/cdrom # tar -C /tmp -zxvf VMwareTools-*.tar.gz
6. Start the installation.
# cd /tmp/vmware-tools-distrib # ./vmware-install.pl
Accept the defaults for every question.
7. Clean up.
# cd /tmp # rm -rf vmware-tools.distrib
8. VMware Tools is now installed and configured. Restart the machine to get all features working.
# reboot
Kamel Messaoudi 