How To Install VMware Tools on Fedora 39

In this tutorial, we will show you how to install VMware Tools on Fedora 39. VMware Tools is a suite of utilities that enhances the performance and functionality of virtual machines (VMs) running on VMware hypervisors. When you install VMware Tools on your Fedora 39 virtual machine, you unlock a range of benefits, including improved graphics performance, seamless mouse pointer integration, and the ability to share files and folders between the host and guest operating systems. Additionally, VMware Tools keeps your VM up-to-date with the latest drivers and optimizations, ensuring a smooth and efficient virtualization experience.

This article assumes you have at least basic knowledge of Linux, know how to use the shell, and most importantly, you host your site on your own VPS. The installation is quite simple and assumes you are running in the root account, if not you may need to add ‘sudo‘ to the commands to get root privileges. I will show you the step-by-step installation of the VMware Tools on a Fedora 39.

Prerequisites

Before diving into the installation process, let’s ensure that you have everything you need:

• A server running one of the following operating systems: Fedora 39.
• It’s recommended that you use a fresh OS install to prevent any potential issues.
• You will need access to the terminal to execute commands. Fedora 39 provides the Terminal application for this purpose. It can be found in your Applications menu.
• A network connection or internet access to download the VMware Tools package.
• A non-root sudo user or access to the root user. We recommend acting as a non-root sudo user, however, as you can harm your system if you’re not careful when acting as the root.

Install VMware Tools on Fedora 39

Step 1. Keeping your system up-to-date is crucial for security and stability. Start by running the following command to update your Fedora 39 installation:

sudo dnf clean all
sudo dnf update

Step 2. Prepare the VMware Tools Installation.

To start the installation process, power on your Fedora 39 VM and log in. If the VMware Tools ISO is not automatically mounted, you’ll need to mount it manually. Here’s how:

1. Click on “VM” in the VMware menu and select “Install VMware Tools.”
2. Open a terminal in the VM and check if the CD-ROM is mounted by running the command: mount | grep iso
3. If the CD-ROM is not mounted, create a new directory for mounting it. For example: sudo mkdir /mnt/cdrom
4. Mount the CD-ROM by executing the following command: sudo mount /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom

Once the VMware Tools ISO is mounted, copy and extract the VMware Tools tar archive:

1. Change to the /tmp directory: cd /tmp
2. Copy the VMware Tools tar archive: cp /mnt/cdrom/VMwareTools-x.x.x-yyyy.tar.gz . (replace x.x.x-yyyy with the actual version number)
3. Extract the archive: tar -zxf VMwareTools-x.x.x-yyyy.tar.gz

If you mounted the CD-ROM manually, unmount it using the command: sudo umount /dev/cdrom

Step 3. Installing Required Packages.

To build the VMware Tools kernel modules, you’ll need to install a few additional packages. Use the following command to install the necessary dependencies:

sudo dnf install gcc kernel-devel kernel-headers make

Step 4. Run the VMware Tools Installer.

With the prerequisites in place, you’re ready to run the VMware Tools installer. Follow these steps:

1. Change to the extracted VMware Tools directory: cd /tmp/vmware-tools-distrib
2. Launch the installer with root privileges: sudo ./vmware-install.pl

The installer will present a series of interactive prompts. In most cases, you can simply press Enter to accept the default values. Here are a few key prompts and their default settings:

• “Do you want to install VMware Tools for Linux or Windows?” – Default: Linux
• “Do you want to enable Guest Authentication?” – Default: No
• “Do you want to enable Drag and Drop functionality?” – Default: Yes
• “Do you want to enable the VMware Host-Guest Filesystem?” – Default: Yes

Once you’ve completed the prompts, the installer will compile and install the necessary kernel modules and components. This process may take a few minutes.

After the installation is complete, restart your VM by running: sudo reboot

Upon reboot, verify that VMware Tools is running by executing the command: vmware-toolbox-cmd -v

If VMware Tools is installed correctly, you should see output similar to:

VMware Tools 12.4.0 (build-18095758)

If you encounter any issues during the installation, here are a few common problems and their solutions:

• Kernel-devel version mismatch: Ensure that the installed kernel-devel package matches the running kernel version. You can check the running kernel version with uname -r and the installed kernel-devel version with rpm -q kernel-devel.
• Secure Boot preventing module loading: If Secure Boot is enabled in your VM’s UEFI firmware, it may prevent the loading of the VMware Tools kernel modules. You can either disable Secure Boot or sign the modules with a Machine Owner Key (MOK).
• Rerunning vmware-config-tools.pl after kernel updates: Whenever you update the kernel on your Fedora 39 VM, you’ll need to rebuild the VMware Tools kernel modules by running sudo vmware-config-tools.pl.

Step 5. Configure VMware Tools

With VMware Tools installed, you can now take advantage of its various features and configure them to suit your needs. Here are a few key features and how to enable them:

• Shared Folders: VMware Tools allows you to share folders between the host and guest systems. To enable this feature, install the vmhgfs-fuse package: sudo dnf install vmhgfs-fuse. Then, create a directory for mounting the shared folder and mount it using the command: vmhgfs-fuse -o allow_other -o auto_unmount /path/to/shared/folder.
• Drag-and-Drop and Copy-Paste: These features enable seamless data transfer between the host and guest systems. They should work automatically after installing VMware Tools. If not, ensure that the “Drag and Drop” and “Copy and Paste” options are enabled in the VM settings.
• Automatic Screen Resizing: VMware Tools can automatically adjust the VM’s screen resolution to match the host system’s window size. This feature should be enabled by default. If it’s not working, check the “Autofit Guest” option in the VM settings.

For more advanced configuration options, you can modify the VMware Tools configuration file located at /etc/vmware-tools/tools.conf. This file allows you to customize various aspects of VMware Tools, such as the synchronization frequency, logging level, and more.

Congratulations! You have successfully installed VMware Tools. Thanks for using this tutorial for installing the VMware Tools on your Fedora 39 system. For additional or useful information, we recommend you check the official VMware website.