Why do I need to install VMware Tools?
August 30th, 2008 | 
Author: 
It happens more frequently than I would ever imagine, but from time to time I find clients have not installed the VMware tools in their virtual machine’s (VM) operating system. I find it more often in Linux VMs than Windows, but I’ve discovered it for both types of guests none-the-less. Some times the tools install is overlooked or forgotten, but every once in a while I am told something like “Does Linux needed VMware tools?” or “what do the VMware tools do for me anyways?”.
Well, I do not have any unique insight or clever commentary to add, but I am providing the following cut and pastes from the VMware .pdf Basic System Administration Guide as a easy reference. At the very least this post will save me some time because I won’t have to dig this info out of the .pdf again when I am asked.
The following sections provide info on what you install when you install VMware tools as well as steps for installing the tools for both Windows and Linux VMs. The rest of this post is not my material but comes straight from the linked guide above – although not necessarily in the order it appears in the original document, however. Download and read the current version for yourself!
I will add one point that is not covered in the following information. VirtualCenter requires the VMware Tools in the guest in order to be able to monitor and send alerts on the VMs, and to also populate various information like the VM’s ip address in the VI Client session.
Installing and Upgrading VMware Tools
VMware Tools is a suite of utilities that enhances the performance of the virtual machine’s guest operating system and improves management of the virtual machine. Installing VMware Tools in the guest operating system is vital. Although the guest operating system can run without VMware Tools, you lose important functionality and convenience.
When you install VMware Tools, you install:
- The VMware Tools service (VMwareService.exe on Windows guests or vmware-guestd on Linux and Solaris guests). This service synchronizes the time in the guest operating system with the time in the host operating system. On Windows guests, it also controls grabbing and releasing the mouse cursor.
- A set of VMware device drivers, including an SVGA display driver, the vmxnet networking driver for some guest operating systems, the BusLogic SCSI driver for some guest operating systems, the memory control driver for efficient memory allocation between virtual machines, the sync driver to quiesce I/O for Consolidated Backup, and the VMware mouse driver.
- The VMware Tools control panel, which lets you modify settings, shrink virtual disks, and connect and disconnect virtual devices.
- A set of scripts that helps you to automate guest operating system operations. The scripts run when the virtual machine’s power state changes if you configure them to do so.
- The VMware user process (VMwareUser.exe on Windows guests or vmware-user on Linux and Solaris guests), which enables you to copy and paste text between the guest and managed host operating systems.
- On Linux and Solaris guests, this process controls grabbing and releaseing the mouse cursor when the SVGA driver is not installed.
- The VMware Tools user process is not installed on NetWare operating systems. Instead, the vmwtool program is installed. It controls the grabbing and releasing of the mouse cursor. It also allows you copy and paste text.
NOTE If you do not have VMware Tools installed in your virtual machine, you cannot
use the shutdown or restart options. You can use only the Power options. If you want
to shut down the guest operating system, shut it down from within the virtual machine
console before you power off the virtual machine.
To install or upgrade VMware Tools on a Windows Guest
- Open a console to the virtual machine.
- Power on the virtual machine.
- After the guest operating system starts, right?click the virtual machine and choose Install VMware Tools.
- From inside the virtual machine, click OK to confirm that you want to install VMware Tools and launch the InstallShield wizard.
- If you have autorun enabled in your guest operating system (the default setting for Windows operating systems), a dialog box appears.
- If autorun is not enabled, run the VMware Tools installer. Click Start > Run and enter D:\setup.exe, where D: is your first virtual CD?ROM drive.
- Follow the onscreen instructions.
- On Windows Server 2003, the SVGA driver is installed automatically, and the guest operating system uses it after it reboots.
- After you install VMware Tools, Windows 2000 and Windows XP guest operating systems must be rebooted to use the new driver.
To install or upgrade VMware Tools on a Linux guest with the tar installer or
RPM installer
- Open a console to the virtual machine.
- Power on the virtual machine.
- After the guest operating system starts, right?click the virtual machine and choose Install VMware Tools.
- The remaining steps take place inside the virtual machine.
- As root (su -), mount the VMware Tools virtual CD?ROM image and change to a working directory (for example, /tmp), as follows.
- Some Linux distributions use different device names or organize the /dev directory differently. Modify the following commands to reflect the conventions used by your distribution:
- mount /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom
- cd /tmp
- NOTE Some Linux distributions automatically mount CD?ROMs. If your distribution uses automounting, do not use the mount and umount commands described in this procedure. You still must untar the VMware Tools installer to /tmp.
- NOTE If you have a previous installation, delete the previous vmware-tools-distrib directory before installing. The default location of this directory is: /tmp/vmware-tools-distrib
- Uncompress the installer and unmount the CD?ROM image.
- Depending on whether you are using the tar installer or the RPM installer, do one of the following:
- For the tar installer, at the command prompt, enter:
-
- tar zxpf /mnt/cdrom/VMwareTools-5.0.0-
.tar.gz
- umount /dev/cdrom
- Where
is the build/revision number of the tools release.
- tar zxpf /mnt/cdrom/VMwareTools-5.0.0-
- For the RPM installer, at the command prompt, enter:
-
- rpm -Uhv /mnt/cdrom/VMwareTools-5.0.0-
.i386.rpm
- umount /dev/cdrom
- Where
is the build/revision number of the tools release.
- rpm -Uhv /mnt/cdrom/VMwareTools-5.0.0-
- Depending on whether you are using the tar installer or the RPM installer, do one of the following:
- For the tar installer, run the VMware Tools tar installer:
-
- cd vmware-tools-distrib
- ./vmware-install.pl
- Respond to the configuration questions on the screen. Press Enter to accept the default value.
- For the RPM installer, configure VMware Tools:
-
- vmware-config-tools.pl
- Respond to the questions the installer displays on the screen. Press Enter to accept the default value.
- Log off the root account. #exit
- Start your graphical environment.
- In an X terminal, open the VMware Tools Properties dialog box: #vmware-toolbox &
NOTE If you attempt to install an rpm installation over a tar installation—or the
reverse—the installer detects the previous installation and must convert the
installer database format before continuing.
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Posted in VirtualCenter, VirtualCenter, how to, vmtools, vmware | 
Tags: backup, esx, how to, linux, virtualcenter, virtualmachine, vmware, vmware tools, windows
I am always surprised when I see a VM without the tools on it. so little effort for so much return.
My experience has been much like yours.. our Linux guests are likely to not have tools at all, while our Windows guests are much more likely to have out of date tools.
I was pleased when I noticed that the latest release of virtual center has the tools install with an automatic reboot feature with the ability to pass install parameters. It’s been a great feature for our server that are in build.
All my linux servers are just that — servers with no gui support whatsoever. However, I just installed VMware Tools yesterday, and figured out that I’m going to have to install the X Window System just so I can access VMware Tools.
I’m not quite sure why VMware Tools has been written to only run in a gui environment. What’s the problem with the command line?
Karryn,
You would only need X Windows if you wanted to use the vmware-toolbox utility. I would just do without that GUI, and you obviously won’t need the visual enhancements from the console. You’ll still need tools for these other services:
* vmware-guestd – the VMware tools service
* vmhgfs – shared folders service
* vmmemctl – the memory ballooning driver that assists ESX memory management
* vmxnet – the network driver
* vmsync- the service that freezes and then thraws the file system for snapshots
I’ve spent a large part of today trying to figure out exactly what part of VMware Tools (or of something else) I had installed. Turns out it’s vmware-guestd, and it’s running.
This is a new VM of Ubuntu Hardy, and I’m trying to get things right, because it’s the prototype — or first prototype, anyway — for a number of Linux MySQL server VMs. However, I only have one toe out of the NFC camp right now as far as VMware is concerned; my VMware training won’t be until the end of the month… Please excuse any frustration that leaked out between the words in my original post.
Where might I find more documentation on the various pieces of VMware Tools and related services? I’ve found lots of information on how to install everything and a little bit of info on open-vm-tools, but not a whole lot on how to use each service, or even the details of what it does. I only just discovered some information on VMware Tools in the Workstation documentation, but more information would be nice.
Thank you so much for your answer. I prefer my job when there’s not too much frustration endurance training.
Karryn
Karryn,
The VMware Basic System Administration Guide (http://vmware.com/pdf/vi3_35/esx_3/r35u2/vi3_35_25_u2_admin_guide.pdf) is a good start and it’s what I used for the material in this post. There are some additional details in that guide. Have you had a chance to check it out yet?
Have you seen Ubuntu’s Community documentation on VMware tools? (https://help.ubuntu.com/community/VMware/Tools)
Also, the VMware Appliance Marketplace has a Ubuntu 8.04 Server VM for download with the tools already installed for you. Not sure if you could use this as your template (or the start of your template), but maybe at the least you can use it as a comparison? Check it out at http://www.vmware.com/appliances/directory/1226
I found one how-to on installing VMware Tools without X11:
http://www.gorillapond.com/2006/07/31/install-vmware-tools-on-ubuntu/
There’s also this one, but it appears to be pretty much a copy of the first one.
http://tech.xddd.org/2008/04/install-vmware-tools-on-ubuntu.html
It was reassuring to find out I wasn’t the only one that didn’t want to install a desktop on my server.
Thanks again for the help –
Karryn
@rbrambley, I don't think you ever answered @Karryn's fundamental question: why would anyone want to install vmware tools on a headless server?
I have a few I manage, and am wondering if the advantages (if there are any) outweigh the disadvantages inherent in installing more bloat on my servers. From your article and comments, I gather that there's another network driver (networking seems fine without it — what advantages does it give?), a time sync service (my servers run an NTP client, so worthless), cut-and-paste assist (I generally only SSH in, so worthless), and memory and disk management services (what *advantage* do they give?).
From what you've written, and from the limited info on the vmware site, it seems that vmware tools are only of real use when running a GUI.
Roy,
I can almost understand why you consider VMware Tools bloat when looking at the NTP, folder sharing, cut and paste, and just the drivers installed. I would argue you would want the VMware specifc drivers to optimize the guest's physical access to the host's resources and provide true mobility via a universal HAL so that VMotion and cloning works properly for example. But, if you say “No” to the drivers, do you not want to be able to make snapshots, automate guest operations, communicate a heartbeat back to your management server, and enable host memory management, sharing, and VM memory over allocation (more vRAM in guests than physical RAM in host)? I think Karen picked up on those points, but I'm not 100% sure.
For various reasons, NTP service is NOT reliable in a virtual environment.
In fact, NTP can cause your clock to run further out of sync.
The safe thing to do is to run NTP sync on your host and utilize guest time sync feature of VMware tools.
The flexible network driver may meet YOUR needs, but the vmxnet driver in VMware tools is faster and more efficient.
The balloon driver for overcommitting memory on the host and reclaiming unused memory on VMs REQUIRES vmware tools.
For various reasons, NTP service is NOT reliable in a virtual environment.
In fact, NTP can cause your clock to run further out of sync.
The safe thing to do is to run NTP sync on your host and utilize guest time sync feature of VMware tools.
The flexible network driver may meet YOUR needs, but the vmxnet driver in VMware tools is faster and more efficient.
The balloon driver for overcommitting memory on the host and reclaiming unused memory on VMs REQUIRES vmware tools.