this is obsolete doc -- see http://doc.nethence.com/ instead

VMware server 1.x guests 

http://pbraun.nethence.com/doc/emulators/vmware_server.html 

http://pbraun.nethence.com/doc/emulators/vmware_server_guests.html 

vmware-tools prerequesties 

On RHEL4 

Make sure you've got those packages installed, 

yum install glibc-kernheaders kernel-smp-devel gcc

yum update kernel-smp

sync

reboot

Note. rhel4 dependencies : cpp, glibc-devel, glibc-headers, glibc, glibc-common, libgcc 

Note. kernel packages need to have the exact same version (hence the update) 

On RHEL5 

Kernel packages (and running kernel) need to have the exact same version. Otherwise you could just disable the [updates] paragraph from YUM configuration. Make sure you've got those packages installed, 

yum install \

kernel-headers \

kernel \

kernel-devel \

gcc

yum update \

kernel-headers \

kernel \

kernel-devel \

gcc

sync

reboot

Note. for a XEN dom0 inside VMware server 1.x (yes it works), 

yum update \

kernel-headers \

kernel-xen \

kernel-xen-devel \

gcc

sync

reboot

also for xen dom0's bridge we need promiscuous mode (not sure it's the default), 

ethernet0.noPromisc = "false"

Disable the hardware clock, 

mv /sbin/hwclock /sbin/hwclock.dist

touch /sbin/hwclock

chmod +x /sbin/hwclock

otherwise we get that error at system startup & shutdown, 

select() to /dev/rtc to wait for clock tick timed out

vmware-tools installation 

Provide the VMware Tools virtual CD to the VM, 

VM > Install VMware Tools

install the RPM, 

cd /mnt

mkdir cdrom

mount /dev/cdrom cdrom

cd cdrom

rpm -ivh VMwareTools-*.rpm

cd ..

umount cdrom

configure VMware Tools (don't use SSH on this one, network gets disconnected), 

cd ~/

vmware-config-tools.pl

apply immediately, 

service network stop

service vmware-tools restart

service network start

lsmod | grep pcnet32  # should be empty

lsmod | grep vmxnet  # should return "vmxnet"

Note. you should install ntp, configure /etc/ntp.conf and make sure the daemon is enabled at startup. So time isn't out of sync when you start the machine after a while. 

Shared raw disk 

Let's say you've got two cluster nodes VM and you want them to access the same shared raw disk. Software iSCSI sometimes isn't enought (e.g. for Veritas and MC/SG) because of missing low level SCSI features. Here's how to proceed with VMware Server 1.x. 

Create a new disk on VM node1, 

^D > Add > Hard disk

Path : d:\vmware\cluster_common\shared.vmdk

Mode : independent / persistent

Edit the .vmx configuration file for each VM node, add/change, 

scsi0.present = "TRUE"

scsi0.virtualDev = "lsilogic"

scsi0:0.fileName = "Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4.vmdk"

scsi0:0.present = "TRUE"

scsi0:0.redo = ""

disk.locking = "FALSE"

diskLib.dataCacheMaxReadAheadSize = "0"

diskLib.dataCacheMaxSize = "0"

diskLib.dataCacheMinReadAheadSize = "0"

diskLib.dataCachePageSize = "4096"

diskLib.maxUnsyncedWrites = "0"

scsi1.present = "TRUE"

scsi1.sharedBus = "VIRTUAL"

scsi1.virtualDev = "lsilogic"

scsi1:0.deviceType = "disk"

scsi1:0.fileName = "D:\vmware\vrts_common\fence.vmdk"

scsi1:0.mode = "independent-persistent"

scsi1:0.present = "TRUE"

scsi1:0.redo = ""

scsi1:1.deviceType = "disk"

scsi1:1.fileName = "D:\vmware\vrts_common\shared.vmdk"

scsi1:1.mode = "independent-persistent"

scsi1:1.present = "TRUE"

scsi1:1.redo = ""

Note the added scsi1 LSI logic controller 

Refs. 

http://www.oracle-base.com/articles/10g/OracleDB10gR2RACInstallationOnCentos4UsingVMware.php 

http://www.clusterbuilder.com/vmware/vmware.html 

VM template 

To make a Linux template : 

- usual post-installation 

- vmware-tools 

- disable eth0 from startup and remove its MAC address from the configurations 

- use a dummy hostname e.g. tmp.example.net 

Once you extract the archive, you can rename the VM, 

displayName = "RHEL5"

and remove all the ethernet lines, 

ethernet0.addressType = "generated"

ethernet0.generatedAddress = "00:0c:29:da:7d:e5"

ethernet0.generatedAddressOffset = "0"

Note. you may need to increese memory and add a disk for the needs of the VM (e.g. for Oracle), therefore it's preferable to shut the VM down before you create the archive, instead of using Pause. 

Note. also disconnect the virtual CD player 

Note. once the VM is up, configure hostname and network (don't forget /etc/hosts). 

Note. in case you didn't remove the MAC address you might have to fix this on RHEL, 

cd /etc

find . | grep .bak$

rm ....bak

Troubleshooting 

When trying to install (an old version of) slackware as guest, the default kernel (bare.i) sees no disk. In VMware Server's guest configuration, choose, 

Linux / kernel 2.4 (provides BusLogic SCSI)

and use that kernel to boot the installation media, 

scsi.s

Note. more recent slackware versions using the hugesmp.s kernel should work by default. 

When trying to install a netbsd guest, you can use that guest configuration in VMware Server, 

Other / FreeBSD

SLES VM 

With SLES or OES, you need to manually load the network module to startup a network installation (netInstall.sh), 

pcnet32

X on a VMware workstation VM 

On VMware workstation, here's a working 1024x768 X11 configuration, 

Section "ServerLayout"

    Identifier     "Default Layout"

    Screen      0  "Screen0" 0 0

    InputDevice    "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"

EndSection

Section "Monitor"

    Identifier "Monitor0"

    HorizSync 1.0 - 10000.0

    VertRefresh 1.0 - 10000.0

EndSection

Section "InputDevice"

    Identifier  "Keyboard0"

    Driver      "kbd"

    Option      "XkbModel" "pc105"

    Option      "XkbLayout" "us"

EndSection

Section "Device"

    Identifier  "Videocard0"

    Driver      "vmware"

EndSection

Section "Screen"

    Identifier "Screen0"

    Device     "Videocard0"

    Monitor "Monitor0"

    DefaultDepth     24

    SubSection "Display"

        Depth 24

        Modes "1024x768" "800x600"

    EndSubSection

EndSection