VMware Workstation 9 - Unity

[kasper]

Greetings,

I would like to remove Unity and not use it.  I've tried config.ini, .vmx entries etc.

Yet it still bites.

Listed below are 2 samples Windows guest messages.  The trouble is sometimes

a guest generates many of these and other Unity messages slowing it down.

Here are some the options i've tried:

isolation.tools.unity.disable = "true"

unity.enableLaunchMenu = "FALSE"

unity.showBadges = "FALSE"

unity.showBorders = "FALSE"

unity.wasCapable = "FALSE"

Here are the guest event log entries:

Log Name:      Application

Source:        VMware Tools

Date:          9/3/2012 5:16:43 PM

Event ID:      1000

Task Category: None

Level:         Warning

Keywords:      Classic

User:          WIN-88GB6E1I0A8\janitor

Computer:      WIN-88GB6E1I0A8

Description:

[ warning] [vmusr:vmtoolsd] Failed registration of app type 2 (Signals) from plugin unity.

Event Xml:

<Event xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event">

  <System>

    <Provider Name="VMware Tools" />

    <EventID Qualifiers="0">1000</EventID>

    <Level>3</Level>

    <Task>0</Task>

    <Keywords>0x80000000000000</Keywords>

    <TimeCreated SystemTime="2012-09-03T21:16:43.000000000Z" />

    <EventRecordID>56435</EventRecordID>

    <Channel>Application</Channel>

    <Computer>WIN-88GB6E1I0A8</Computer>

    <Security UserID="S-1-5-21-1052145877-4030300300-2459162317-500" />

  </System>

  <EventData>

    <Data>[ warning] [vmusr:vmtoolsd] Failed registration of app type 2 (Signals) from plugin unity.

</Data>

  </EventData>

</Event>

Log Name:      Application

Source:        VMware Tools

Date:          9/3/2012 5:16:43 PM

Event ID:      1000

Task Category: None

Level:         Warning

Keywords:      Classic

User:          WIN-88GB6E1I0A8\janitor

Computer:      WIN-88GB6E1I0A8

Description:

[ warning] [vmusr:vmtoolsd] Error sending capability unity: Unknown command

Event Xml:

<Event xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event">

  <System>

    <Provider Name="VMware Tools" />

    <EventID Qualifiers="0">1000</EventID>

    <Level>3</Level>

    <Task>0</Task>

    <Keywords>0x80000000000000</Keywords>

    <TimeCreated SystemTime="2012-09-03T21:16:43.000000000Z" />

    <EventRecordID>56436</EventRecordID>

    <Channel>Application</Channel>

    <Computer>WIN-88GB6E1I0A8</Computer>

    <Security UserID="S-1-5-21-1052145877-4030300300-2459162317-500" />

  </System>

  <EventData>

    <Data>[ warning] [vmusr:vmtoolsd] Error sending capability unity: Unknown command

</Data>

  </EventData>

</Event>

[mfelker]

  If you don't like./use why not just choose to not click on the Unity tab?  There several GUI  tabs myself and other don't use.  (for example the floppy device  under customize hardware) that  its just not worth the effort to try and remove.

[kasper]

Greetings,

Thank you for your reply.

I've tried disabled it including your suggestion.

The issue is that I am getting an event log message every couple of seconds on said guest and

it appears to be coming from some issue with 'unity'.

I will look deeper into what's going on as it appears this is not happening

to other people.

Thank you,

Stan

[VruceMayne]

It's just a warning message.  Is it flooding your logs?

[neugartIT]

Hi,

I have the same issue on two of our servers. We did an update to vmware version 5.1 last week and now I discovered 2 servers with this warning messages problem.

A reboot solved the problem for a few hours, but suddenly the messages appear again... Every second a new one!

[kasper]

This is what I did:

- disabled the VMWare service on the guest.

- for Windows, I removed the 'Run' entry that loaded VMWare tools.

So now I have the drivers working but no Tools which I can live with.

Stan

[admin]

Stan,

Please give the following steps a shot.

In your guest VM:

1. Explorer > c:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Tools\plugins\vmusr.
2. Locate unity.dll and delete it (or move it to another folder).
3. Either log out+log in or reboot the VM.

You'll then have full Tools functionality sans interference from the Unity plugin.

  - Ryan

[bsuter]

Hi Ryan

I've the same warnings on most of my vm server after upgrade to vSphere 5.1 VM Tools included.

Is this the only workaround or do you deliver another solution for this ? (about 80 servers in my environment)

Do I have some more problems in the future if i rename or delete the unity.dll ?

thanks for your help

[admin]

Another potential workaround:

http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=203635...

Nuking unity.dll, which I can't imagine is officially supported, won't cause any significant problems for you, assuming you don't need to migrate those VMs to a Workstation or Fusion host and attempt to use Unity.

[MKguy]

To re-iterate what I wrote in another thread regarding the log spew issue on ESXi (http://communities.vmware.com/message/2186531#2186531):

One has to question when VMware will finally notice that it's a better idea to simply not package ESXi VMware Tools with workstation/player components (no, I do not want my VMs to share files with the host, which won't work anyways).

Same applies to unity features obviously. The ESXi Tools are already specifically packed (e.g. containing vShield driver) anyways.

For the record, I actually got these 5 Windows Eventlog error messages on every login (not constantly like in the other log spew case) after setting the following VMX parameters, which are recommendations from the vSphere Security Hardening Guide (http://www.vmware.com/go/securityguides):

isolation.tools.unity.disable=true
isolation.tools.unity.push.update.disable=true
isolation.tools.unity.taskbar.disable=true
isolation.tools.unity.windowContents.disable=true
isolation.tools.unityActive.disable=true
isolation.tools.unityInterlockOperation.disable=true

Causing Eventlog errors:

[ warning] [vmusr:vmusr] SOCKET could not create new socket, error 10106: The requested service provider could not be loaded or initialized

[ warning] [vmusr:vmusr] vmware::tools::UnityPBRPCServer::Start: NetServer::StartListening failed Asyncsocket error:(1)

[ warning] [vmusr:vmtoolsd] Failed registration of app type 2 (Signals) from plugin unity.

[ warning] [vmusr:vmtoolsd] Error sending capability unity: Unknown command

[ warning] [vmusr:vmtoolsd] Error sending capability unity.taskbar: Unknown command

Deleting the unity.dll "fixed" the errors.