VMware Server 2.0.2 on 64 bit Fedora 14, Ubuntu 10.0.4

Having more than 4 gigs of memory for running Oracle Fusion Middleware is essential, and it requires 64 bit operating system. As lot of things are often run as VMware images there's a problem: VMware does not support latest 64 bit Linux releases. With some help it can be done. Radu Cotescu has written scripts that virtually solve the problem.

Fedora 14

I spent considerable amount of time trying to get VMware working on Fedora 13 but finally gave up as it seemed impossible, and didn't find anybody who would have gotten it working. Now Fedora 14 fortunately is working. Here's how:

Turn SELinux to disabled, if it's not already

vi /etc/sysconfig/selinux

and set following:

SELINUX=disabled

reboot

Update kernel and install needed packages:

yum update kernel
yum install kernel-devel-`uname -r` xinetd gcc gcc-c++ perl-devel perl-ExtUtils-Embed wget vim-enhanced

In your working directory, fetch & unpack Radu's script and VMware Server:

cd [working directory]
wget --no-check-certificate http://codebin.cotescu.com/vmware/vmware-server-2.0.x-kernel-2.6.3x-install.sh
tar xvfz raducotescu-vmware-server-linux-2.6.3x-kernel-release-1.5-1-g71f8b66.tar.gz
cp [location of VMware server]/VMware-server-2.0.2-203138.x86_64.tar.gz .

Run install & configure (which will fail until next step):

./vmware-server-2.0.x-kernel-2.6.3x-install.sh

Additionally Fedora needs one change to VMware configure script:

vi /usr/bin/vmware-config.pl

Around line 2702 replace

[...] if (-e $answer . '/linux/utsrelease.h') { $uts_headers .= "#include <linux/utsrelease.h>\n"; } [...]

with

[...] if (-e $answer . '/generated/utsrelease.h') { $uts_headers .= "#include <./generated/utsrelease.h> \n"; } [...]

Finally run configure:

/usr/bin/vmware-config.pl

Ubuntu 10.0.4

Ubuntu has similar process, but no need to edit VMware configure script. Just fetch & unpack Radu's script and VMware Server, run install and configure. (You might want to upgrade kernel before starting).

cd [working directory]
wget [http://codebin.cotescu.com/vmware/vmware-server-2.0.x-kernel-2.6.3x-install.sh]
tar xvzf raducotescu-vmware-server-linux-2.6.3x-kernel-592e882.tar.gz
cd raducotescu-vmware-server-linux-2.6.3x-kernel-592e882/
cp [location of VMware server]/VMware-server-2.0.2-203138.x86_64.tar.gz .
tar xvzf VMware-server-2.0.2-203138.x86_64.tar.gz
./vmware-server-2.0.x-kernel-2.6.3x-install.sh

..and follow install process, just press enter as default for everything.


Firefox 3.6.x Console plugin doesn't work

As of writing VMware Server console plugin does not work in Firefox 3.6.x, you will get "Cannot access virtual machine console. The request timed out" error. Solution is to use Internet Explorer or downgrade to Firefox 3.5.9 until it works.

Any version, locale and platform version of Firefox can be fetched through a www.mozilla.com URL, so for instance fetch 3.5.9 package from http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/products/download.html?product=firefox-3.5.9&os=linux&lang=en-US. Then unpack and run.

cd [working directory]
tar jxpvf firefox-3.5.9.tar.bz2
./firefox/firefox

On Ubuntu you probably get "./run-mozilla.sh: 399: ./firefox-bin: not found" and need to install libraries to support running 32 bits applications:

sudo apt-get install ia32-libs

Then just access http://127.0.0.1:8222 (or whatever port you specified) and VMware Server should be running smoothly.


Additional notes

Intel Virtualization Technology must be enabled to run 64 bit guest operating systems on Intel processors. On Lenovo T410 this seems to be disabled by default, so it needs to be enabled in BIOS setup.

Network proxy must be configured for yum and wget if you're installing inside corporate network.


Helpful links:

http://www.howtoforge.com/how-to-install-vmware-server-2-on-a-fedora-14-desktop-kernel-2.6.35
http://www.marcosorfila.com/site/vmware-server-202-on-ubuntu-1004
http://radu.cotescu.com/how-to-install-vmware-server-2-0-x-on-ubuntu-9-10-karmic-koala/
http://www.marcosorfila.com/site/installing-older-versions-of-firefox-in-ubuntu-1004-64-bits/