Need help with CentOS in VMWare environment

Friz · 08-29-2011, 05:57 PM

Hi Linuxquestions.org!

I would be very grateful for any help you guys can offer. My ultimate goal is to install and manage a Linux server on my VMWare infrastructure (there are currently no Linux servers, only Windows).

The following are my goals with this server

1. Install CentOS as the Linus distro (done)
2. Install VMWare tools on this server, so that I can resize the desktop, etc. (Having trouble)
3. Add this server to existing Active Directory structure, complete with single sign on(Don't know where to begin).
4. Create shared folders that will share with both Windows and Linux clients.

So, let's start with number 2, for my first question:

I've mounted the VMWare tools ISO to the virtual CD drive, unpacked the tar.gz using ARK, and ran the install.pl file. The installation was successful, however nothing happened when I rebooted the machine.

I then ran the vmware-user setup program, which throws the following error(s):

Failed to get value for 'desktop/gnome/interface/accessibility': Failed to contact configuration server; some possible causes are that you need to enable TCP/IP networking for ORBit, or you have stale NFS locks due to a system crash. (Details - 1: Failed to get connection to session: Did not receive a reply. Possible causes include: the remote application did not send a reply, the message bus security policy blocked the reply, the reply timeout expired, or the network connection was broken.)

Failed to get value for 'desktop/gnome/interface/accessibility': Failed to contact confuguration server.

kbp · 08-29-2011, 06:22 PM

I'd just grab the relevant packages from http://packages.vmware.com/tools for a start.

Friz · 08-29-2011, 07:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kbp

I'd just grab the relevant packages from http://packages.vmware.com/tools for a start.

Hi, and thanks for the reply.

Since CentOS is a fully supported guest OS in the VMWare environment, I assumed (perhaps wrongly) that I could just use the ISO that came with VMWare (I just clicked "install VMTools from my CentOS desktop). I am also a Linux newbie, and don't know how to download and install packages without using the package manager and searching for software.

kbp · 08-29-2011, 10:40 PM

Try running this (untested) but check the url matches your version of ESX:

Code:

cat <<'EOF' > /etc/yum.repos.d/vmtools.repo
[vmtools]
name=Vmware tools repository
baseurl=http://packages.vmware.com/tools/esx/4.1latest/rhel6/$basearch/index.html
enabled=1
gpgcheck=0
EOF

Now run 'yum repolist' to check whether the repo is functioning and then 'yum -y install vmware-open-vm-tools-{common,kmod,nox}' to install vmtools packages.

You may want to clean up what you already installed first though...

hth

Friz · 08-29-2011, 11:07 PM

Hi KBP,

Thank you again for the help. I will run that as soon as I can. Quick question: Do you think I should have installed the 32 bit version of CentOS rather than the x64?

kbp · 08-30-2011, 02:39 AM

No ... 32bit apps will still run a 64bit OS plus you get the larger memory space etc...

sandwormusmc · 08-31-2011, 09:03 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Friz

Hi Linuxquestions.org!

I would be very grateful for any help you guys can offer. My ultimate goal is to install and manage a Linux server on my VMWare infrastructure (there are currently no Linux servers, only Windows).

The following are my goals with this server

1. Install CentOS as the Linus distro (done)
2. Install VMWare tools on this server, so that I can resize the desktop, etc. (Having trouble)
3. Add this server to existing Active Directory structure, complete with single sign on(Don't know where to begin).
4. Create shared folders that will share with both Windows and Linux clients.

So, let's start with number 2, for my first question:

I've mounted the VMWare tools ISO to the virtual CD drive, unpacked the tar.gz using ARK, and ran the install.pl file. The installation was successful, however nothing happened when I rebooted the machine.

I then ran the vmware-user setup program, which throws the following error(s):

Failed to get value for 'desktop/gnome/interface/accessibility': Failed to contact configuration server; some possible causes are that you need to enable TCP/IP networking for ORBit, or you have stale NFS locks due to a system crash. (Details - 1: Failed to get connection to session: Did not receive a reply. Possible causes include: the remote application did not send a reply, the message bus security policy blocked the reply, the reply timeout expired, or the network connection was broken.)

Failed to get value for 'desktop/gnome/interface/accessibility': Failed to contact confuguration server.

For #3, try Centrify here. I'm currently using it at work to do authentication from my Fedora 15 laptop to Active Directory. The installer is pretty straightforward and debugging isn't too difficult.

For #4, you can use Samba to setup those shares. I actually even stumbled across a Centrify document on how to integrate Samba with AD (haven't tried it yet, though).

As for VMWare Tools, I've never had much luck installed or using those ... VirtualBox seems to have better tools integration so I've stuck with that, and all of our CentOS boxes in ESX are in run level 3 with no GUI.