VmWare Tools installation files auto-removal, how to suppress that?

[VimaUser]

The VmWare Tools installation manual proposes tarball unpacking to /tmp/vmware-tools-distrib.

Following the installation the unpacked files in /tmp/vmware-tools-distrib are auto-removed.

What is the reason of auto-removal?

Is this removal made by installer script, or rather at run-time?

Which script and the scripts line number needs adaptation to suppress this auto-removal?

[vmxmr]

I assume that you are installing into a Linux distro.

I always unpack VMware Tools into a folder on my Desktop and then run the installer from there. It does not auto-remove the files. After installation is complete, I delete the folder. Frankly, I must have missed the instruction that says to use /tmp.

I suggest that you try unpacking somewhere other than /tmp. See if that works.

[VimaUser]

It is the VmWare installation instructions in Fusion help where it is said unpack the installer script into /tmp.

I do not delete the folder manually. Nor I am going to do that. Next guest kernel update and the chance is quite well

I will need it again. Some step in installation process or installation post-processing makes it automatically.

Who is it and how to disable it?

You are suggesting to unpack to other place than /tmp. Does it mean /tmp was basically a volatile storage?

[vmxmr]

[...] You are suggesting to unpack to other place than /tmp. Does it mean /tmp was basically a volatile storage?

I don't know. I must admit, it was many years ago when I read the instructions. I may have forgotten something, but my method seems to work for me.

When I install VMware Tools in Linux, I do the following:

• Copy the tar.gz file from the virtual CDROM to the Desktop folder in my admin account, using drag and drop.
• Double-click the tar.gz file on the desktop, which opens the Archive Manager application.
• Extract the vmware-tools-distrib folder and its contents by dragging it to the Desktop using drag and drop.
• Open a terminal.
• In the terminal window, cd to the Desktop directory, then to the vmware-tools-distrib directory.
• In the terminal window, run "sudo ./vmware-install.pl" and follow the prompts.
• When I am done and I am sure that VMware Tools is working, I delete the tar.gz file and the vmware-tools-distrib folder in the Desktop.

Right or wrong, that works for me.

Note: Many Linux distros have "open-vmware-tools" preinstalled. In those cases, you do not need to install VMware Tools from the Virtual Machine menu. You may have to install another package for the display from within Linux. You would use yum or apt-get, depending on the distro. The package is "open-vm-tools-desktop". See this thread:

Linux Guest Display Resolution Fails in Full Screen

[VimaUser]

Hi,

Thanks for input from you. As the vmWare's virtualization solution used in my env. is Fusion version 7.x

it doesn't change frequently. It looks like it won't change any more and it's unclear for me how soon (how far)

upgrade to higher version will be made in our env. So the fist 3 steps from your procedure do not need

be carried out every time. Just once, huge time sparing as kernel change in Ubuntu is a frequent deal

even if to limit updates to security updates only.

That with open-vm-tools is a big story. I have to lead long discussion with VmWare and Ubuntu

user communities as it does not work as expected. VmWare recommends to change to open-vm-tools,

on another side the in open-vm-tools programmers and user community one can find statements "use bundled VmWare Tools"

as reply to trouble reporting. Me tried to use open tools as those promise less efforts on guest kernel updates,

which as said are frequent deal. Shared folders are not working if to take open-vm-tools and Ubuntu 15.10.

That's the reason why I am back to bundled VmWare Tools.

While having open-vm-tools I had to install bundled tools as well in order to have shared folders working.