Installing VMware Tools
The main difference between installing on a VMware Server virtual machine and on a native machine is that you need to install VMware Tools (see Figure 2) to enable the shared clipboard and the ability to move your mouse between the active VMware window and your host OS desktop/windows.
Figure 2 VMware Tools installation.
Follow these steps to install VMware Tools:
- On the VMware Server console, choose VM > Install VMware Tools.
- The VMware Tools CD icon appears on the desktop. Use this icon to open a file manager window with the VMware Tools tarball (tar.gz) archive in it, shown as a folder.
- Click open the folder. In it is another folder, labeled vmware-tools-distrib.
- Drag this folder to the desktop and drop it there.
- On the top Solaris menu, choose Applications > System Tools. Drag-and-drop Terminal onto the desktop. (You're going to use it a lot.)
- Open the Terminal icon and run this command:
$ su root
- Enter the root password as you would on Linux. (If you're an Ubuntu user, remember the root password you picked during startup, and enter that.)
- Enter the following commands:
# cd Desktop # cd vmware-tools-distrib # ./vmware-install.pl
- Create a launcher icon by right-clicking the desktop and selecting Create launcher from the menu. In the new window, type VMware Tools in the Name text box. Enter /usr/bin/vmware-toolbox in the Command box.
- Open the new icon.
Automatic window resize doesn't work, but it is nice to be able to move the cursor freely into and out of the console. The shared clipboard works between the guest VM and the host or between two running virtual machines.