Mar 31, 2009

How To Install VMWare Server 2 on Ubuntu 9.04 Server

I just finished installed Ubuntu 9.04 server, and VMWare Server 2 and I can't be more pleased with this pair! The last time I wrote about installing VMWare server was back in Ubuntu 8.04. With that you had to install VMWare server using the VMWare-any-any patch. I can tell you that this is NOT the case in VMWare server 2 on Ubuntu 9.04!

No, I guess the VMWare team finally decided to make an Ubuntu friendly version of their software, and made installation relatively easy! Also, they have done away with the VMWare server console and have gone with a very easy to use Web console! That means less headache for you and me!

So lets get to the nitty gritty. This is what you need to do to install VMWare Server 2 on Ubuntu 9.04:


Note: Since ubuntu server doesn't have a GUI, I had to register for the download then download it to my Windows machine. after that I transferred the VMWare server TAR ball over to a SAMBA share on my Ubuntu 9.04 server. Feel free to get the tarball onto your server any way you see fit ;-)

Now, to the install steps:

  1. Install the necesarry prerequisites


  2. sudo apt-get install linux-headers-`uname -r` build-essential xinetd

  3. Now change into the directory where you saved your VMWare TAR ball. I saved mine in /home/paul/vm

    cd /home/paul/vm


  4. Now Extract the TAR ball and run the installer

    tar xvfz VMware-server-*.tar.gz

    cd vmware-server-distrib

    sudo ./vmware-install.pl


  5. You can hit enter for all of the defaults, except when asked for a name of an alternate administrator. For that enter your username. If you don't, you will have to reset the root password as that is the default administrator for VMWare Server. Also, when asked for the direcrory of virtual machines, you have the option of saving them in a different directory. I for instance like to save mine in /home/paul/vm.
  6. Near the end, you will have to enter your serial number which you received when you first registered for the download.
  7. Done! Now you are ready to login! You can login to the web console by browsing to http://servername:8222




After building your first machine, you can view it through the web console in IE and Firefox after installing the correct plugins which you will be prompted for in the web console.

That is it! Seriously! Can you believe it? In just about all previous Ubuntu versions, and VMWare Server versions it has been 1.5 bitches to install. This time it is really really easy!

After installing it, let me know what you think in the comments!

[EDIT 6/2/09] - A Lot of you have been experiencing the vsock error. I have not experienced this, but for those of you that have, I found a Pearl script that should resolve your problem. You can download it here: (VSOCK FIX)

To run it open a terminal, and do the following:

  1. CD into the directory where the Pearl script is

    >cd /path/to/vmware-config.pl

  2. Make the script executable

    >chmod +x vmware-config.pl

  3. Patch!

    >sudo patch /usr/bin/vmware-config.pl /path/to/vmware-config.pl
Let me know if that works or not. If not, and if you found a better solution, let me know!

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