Installing VMware Tools in Debian Sarge (3.1)

Tested with VMware Tools v.5.5.2 (VMwareTools-5.5.2-29772.tar.gz).

1. Install software needed by VMware Tools

  1. Install packages to build the kernel modules 
    apt-get install autoconf automake binutils make cpp cpp-3.3 gcc gcc-3.3 kernel-headers-$(uname -r)
  2. Find out where the kernel headers are (you may need this later) 
    ls -d /usr/src/kernel-headers-$(uname -r)*/include

2. Prepare and install VMware Tools

Choose one of a), b), c) or d).

a) If you are running the VM inside VMware Workstation 5.5

  1. From VMware Workstation: go to VM> Install VMware Tools
  2. From the VM: mount the virtual cd drive 
    mount /dev/cdrom /mnt/
  3. Extract VMware Tools to /tmp/ 
    tar -C /tmp -zxvf /mnt/VMwareTools-5.5.2-29772.tar.gz
  4. Unmount the virtual cd drive 
    umount /mnt
  5. Now run the installer 
    cd /tmp/vmware-tools-distrib
./vmware-install.pl
  6. When asked Do you want to run vmware-config-tools.pl?, answer “Yes”.

b) If you have VMware-workstation-5.5.2-29772.tar.gz on disk

  1. Make sure VMware-workstation-5.5.2-29772.tar.gz is on disk inside the VM.
  2. Extract the VMware Tools iso 
    tar --strip-components=3 -zxvf VMware-workstation-5.5.2-29772.tar.gz \
vmware-distrib/lib/isoimages/linux.iso
  3. Create a temporary mount point 
    mkdir /mnt/vmtools-temp
  4. Mount the iso image 
    mount -o loop linux.iso /mnt/vmtools-temp
  5. Copy VMware Tools from the mount 
    cp /mnt/vmtools-temp/VMwareTools-5.5.2-29772.tar.gz /tmp/
  6. Extract VMware Tools to /tmp/ 
    tar -C /tmp -zxvf /mnt/vmtools-temp/VMwareTools-5.5.2-29772.tar.gz
  7. Tidy up 
    umount /mnt/vmtools-temp
rmdir /mnt/vmtools-temp
rm linux.iso
  8. Now run the installer 
    cd /tmp/vmware-tools-distrib
./vmware-install.pl
  9. When asked Do you want to run vmware-config-tools.pl?, answer “Yes”.

c) If you have VMwareTools-5.5.2-29772.tar.gz on disk

  1. Extract VMware Tools to /tmp/ 
    tar -C /tmp -zxvf VMwareTools-5.5.2-29772.tar.gz
  2. Now run the installer 
    cd /tmp/vmware-tools-distrib
./vmware-install.pl
  3. When asked Do you want to run vmware-config-tools.pl?, answer “Yes”.

d) If you cannot do any of these Show answer

  1. Download VMware Workstation Trial (free) from
    http://www.vmware.com/download/ws/
  2. Go to If you have VMwareTools-5.5.2-29772.tar.gz on disk, above.