VMware Player 14.1.2: VMware tools cannot be installed in Windows client.

narke · 07-02-2018, 01:29 PM

I installed VMWare player 14.1.2 on my Slackware 14.2 (kernel 4.17.1) in order to run a Windows 10 guest. But it seemed the "WMware Tools" cannot be installed.

After I booted into the guest, in the WMWare menu, there is an entry: "Install WMware tool", but it's gray out and not clickable. I also found there is no a WMware icon in the system tray and no any WMware things in my "Control Panel", so I think the "WMware Tool" was not installed at all.

I don't know why but I have some clues:

- The method I used to install the VMware is a little strange. I could not get it installed with success, I had to run the installer with options "--console --no-errors" (I learned this from this forum);
- Every time my vmplayer started, there is a warning: I/O warning : failed to load external entity "/etc/vmware/hostd/proxy.xml"

I am not sure whether the above two clues are relevant. Who know how should I get the "WMware Tool" installed in this situation?

Thanks.
-woody

bassmadrigal · 07-03-2018, 11:57 AM

I was holding off on replying to see if anyone was able to help out...

Are you stuck on using VMWare Player? Unfortunately, I don't have any experience with VMWare Player, so I can't really help with your issue. But I do know VirtualBox works great and I know many also use qemu. Both are open-source, if that is any factor in your decision on what to run.

EDIT: Just saw your other post about Windows 10 being slow and realized both were from you, so maybe VirtualBox wouldn't be best for you.

regis_n_bits · 07-03-2018, 06:20 PM

Have you installed all of the various vmware guest ISO's in the VMWare main panel? These ISOs are for each of the various guest OSes that would contain the vmware-tools for a particular guest OS (e.g. pre win95, windows, linux, bsd, etc.)

It's been a couple of years since I last used VMWare on my Slackware box, but I think when you do a check for updates from the VMware main panel, it should notify you about installing these guest ISOs (along with prompting you about any newer VMWare versions too). You would need to install the ISO for your guest OS (Windows in your case).

Once you have the guest ISO installed, then you can try installing the vmware-tools on your VM.