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bkomanet
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

VMWare Workstation 14 Crashes when selecting Edit->Preferences from Ubuntu 18.04

VMWare Workstation 14 seems to work just fine on the most current release of Ubuntu 18.04, but, when I select Edit->Preferences from the VMWare Workstation main menu, the application crashes and a dump file is produced.  This happens on three different computers with the newest Ubuntu 18.04 installed.

The produced log is attached.

Thanks to anyone who can help.

12 Replies
frodo
Community Manager
Community Manager

Can you give more details about WS build, VM OS, and more detail log?

Detail log: WS UI - Help - Support - Collect Support Data - select VM

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bkomanet
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

The WS Build is the most recent Workstation v14 on Linux (just downloaded)

The Host OS is Ubuntu 18.04 64-bit

The Guest OS is any Operating system - any.

This problem occurs when I go to VMWare properties, or, when I try to create a new VMWare guest OS.  If I create the OS on VMWare Fusion, VMWare Workstation 14 on windows or on Ubuntu 16.04, the VM Guest will run on Ubuntu 18.04 just fine.  I just can't change the general VMWare preferences, or, create a new VMWare virtual machine while using Workstation on Ubuntu 18.04..

I opened a service request with VMWare and they told me that a version of VMWare workstation 14 is in the works to support Ubuntu 18.04. 

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bkomanet
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

I ran the procedure to collect host data, but, it ran for over thirty minutes and never ended.

However, this problem is not guest OS related (at least not specifically).  This problem occurs whenever I have Workstation 14 open, (even with no guest running), and I select Edit->Preferences or when I select File -> New Virtual Machine....  Workstation just closes down completely.  I can restart it, but whenever I select those two options, it just ends - window and all.

Just this moment I tried to go to Help->About to get the exact build version (it is the most current build) and Workstation died, again.  It's as if some GUI set of libraries which Workstation is using are not compatible with that version.

GTK problem?

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Scillonian
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

What desktop environment are you using (e.g. KDE, XFCE, MATE, etc)?

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bkomanet
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

BTW, thanks for the quick responses - LOVE VMWare, been using it at IBM since the product was released, but this is a bit of a show stopper.

Ubuntu 18.04 defaults to Gnome and I have not changed that.

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Scillonian
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

Ubuntu 18.04 is new so it could be a GTK dependency problem.

This may not produce anything worthwhile but you could try launching Workstation from a terminal prompt and seeing what gets displayed in the terminal when Workstation crashes. In the past it has helped me track down why an app is crashing but it is hit and miss.

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bkomanet
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Thanks for the suggestion.  I have done this before, but didn't actually document the output.  Here it is (main menu -> Help -> About).  The log file mentioned is what I attached to my original post.

./vmware

Fail to open executable: No such file or directory

Unexpected signal: 11.

VMware Workstation Error:

VMware Workstation unrecoverable error: (vmui)

Unexpected signal: 11.

A log file is available in "/tmp/vmware-bkomanet/vmware-ui-2810.log". 

You can request support. 

To collect data to submit to VMware support, choose "Collect Support Data" from the Help menu.

You can also run the "vm-support" script in the Workstation folder directly.

We will respond on the basis of your support entitlement.

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jhorsman
Contributor
Contributor

I am just going to chime in.. I am running it from kubuntu 18.04 and I am not having problems with that issue.. Only issue I got at this time is if I have enable 3d acceleration on and I fire up a couple VMs.. It pegs X.org to 100 percent.. Disabled it and I have little issue outside of it.

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fa294
Contributor
Contributor

I have the exact same problem - have you been able to figure out a fix?

Strangely, i have Ubuntu 18.04 installed on both my laptop and my desktop, and this only happens on my laptop. It's still happening on 14.1.2, which officially supports Ubuntu 18.04. As far as I can tell from the vmware-ui-PID.log files, both machines are loading the same libraries.

Edit: I managed to fix mine! I compared the output of "dpkg -l" on both machines. My laptop had the package "libsigc++-2.0-0v5" installed, and my desktop didn't. After uninstalling this package from my laptop, the Preferences menu no longer causes VMWare to crash.

Having identified the conflicting library, is there any way to submit a bug report?

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Susie201110141
VMware Employee
VMware Employee

From the UI log: "version=14.1.1 build=build-7528167 ", you are using workstation 14.1.1.

Could you try to upgrade to latest WS 14.1.2  and have a try again?

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fa294
Contributor
Contributor

Susie201110141​ I'm having the same problem again today (the application crashes when I go to Edit>Preferences, or File>New Virtual Machine, etc.), and I'm running 14.1.2. Please see the attached log.

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ALAZEF
Contributor
Contributor

I have the same issue listed in this thread running latest Linux Vmware Pro 14.1.2 on a latest Linux Mint **Cinnamon**.  I resolved the issue by switching my Linux Mint from Cinnamon to MATE X Window System.

I can confirm that the crash is due to Vmware's incompatibility with the latest GTK updates.

Hope this helps others.