A Day in the Life of...

I updated my kernel to 2.6.32 tonight. The VMware Workstation 6.5.3 module configuration build failed horribly. I am using Sidux, a bleeding edge Debian sid distribution. This Arch Linux link solved the problem. These instructions should help users of Debian and Debian based distributions, such as Ubuntu, get VMware Workstation working. The directions assume that you are the root user. If you are an Ubuntu user, try sudo su to get a root prompt.

The first step is to perform the following commands:

# cd /tmp
# tar xf /usr/lib/vmware/modules/source/vmnet.tar
# vi vmnet-only/vnetUserListener.c (near line 37 add #include "compat_sched.h")
# tar cf /usr/lib/vmware/modules/source/vmnet.tar vmnet-only
# tar xf /usr/lib/vmware/modules/source/vmci.tar
# vi vmci-only/linux/vmciKernelIf.c vmci-only/include/pgtbl.h (add #include "compat_sched.h" around line 30)
# tar cf /usr/lib/vmware/modules/source/vmci.tar vmci-only
# vmware-modconfig --console --install-all

The last command will fail, so you probably don't even want to try it. Then go to this section of the Arch Linux wiki page.

Download the vmware-build-modules shell script.

Now check your version of gcc. If it is gcc-4.3, install the latest version and change the symbolic link.

# cd /usr/bin
# ls -al gcc
# apt-get install gcc-4.4
# rm gcc
# ln -s gcc-4.4 gcc
# ls -al gcc

Now cd to the directory you downloaded vmware-build-modules and fix the permissions and execute the shell script.

# cd Desktop
# chmod 755 ./vmware-build-modules
# ./vmware-build-modules

VMware Workstation 6.5.3 should now work properly under Linux kernel 2.6.32.

Labels: VMware modconfig problems