Fedora 13 Guest Tools error under 7.1.4

[gbohn]

Hi;

  I am trying to install VMWare Tools (from 7.1.4) on a Fedora 13 Guest image (with the 2.6.34.8-68.fc13.i686.PAE kernel).  This is on a Windows 7 SP1 Host.

  This seems to mostly work, but I get an error and a few other seemingly unusual things.

  The first error I see is:

"Using 2.6.x kernel build system.
make: Entering directory `/tmp/vmware-root/modules/vmxnet-only'
make -C /lib/modules/2.6.34.8-68.fc13.i686.PAE/build/include/.. SUBDIRS=$PWD SRCROOT=$PWD/. \
          MODULEBUILDDIR= modules
make[1]: Entering directory `/usr/src/kernels/2.6.34.8-68.fc13.i686.PAE'
  CC [M]  /tmp/vmware-root/modules/vmxnet-only/vmxnet.o
/tmp/vmware-root/modules/vmxnet-only/vmxnet.c: In function ‘vmxnet_load_multicast’:
/tmp/vmware-root/modules/vmxnet-only/vmxnet.c:2810: warning: assignment from incompatible pointer type
/tmp/vmware-root/modules/vmxnet-only/vmxnet.c:2810: error: ‘struct netdev_hw_addr’ has no member named ‘next’
make[2]: *** [/tmp/vmware-root/modules/vmxnet-only/vmxnet.o] Error 1
make[1]: *** [_module_/tmp/vmware-root/modules/vmxnet-only] Error 2
make[1]: Leaving directory `/usr/src/kernels/2.6.34.8-68.fc13.i686.PAE'
make: *** [vmxnet.ko] Error 2
make: Leaving directory `/tmp/vmware-root/modules/vmxnet-only'

The fast network device driver (vmxnet module) is used only for our fast
networking interface. The rest of the software provided by VMware Tools is "

   This is followed later with

"The module vmxnet3 has already been installed on this system by another
installer or package and will not be modified by this installer.  Use the flag
--clobber-kernel-modules=vmxnet3 to override.

The module pvscsi has already been installed on this system by another
installer or package and will not be modified by this installer.  Use the flag
--clobber-kernel-modules=pvscsi to override."

  I'm thinking the error is most likely something going wrong.  Is there a way to fix this?

  Also, should I be concerned about the vmxnet3 messages?

  I'm attaching a section of most of the install messages.

  Thanks;

      -Greg

[gbohn]

I solved my vmxnet.c problem. I searched for (and found) the magic incantations to extract and rebuild the vmxnet.c source.

In the vmxnet_load_multicast function, I altered the two conditional compiles of

   #if LINUX_VERSION_CODE >= KERNEL_VERSION(2, 6, 34)

        to

    #if LINUX_VERSION_CODE >= KERNEL_VERSION(2, 6, 35)

and recompiled with

     vmware-config-tools.pl -c

I can't say if that is actually the correct fix, but it had the effect of allowing vmxnet.c to be compiled without error on my system. (This is using the current FC 13 32-bit kernel 2.6.34.8-68.fc13.i686.PAE).

   -Greg

[pavel-a]

Hi,

After you got these errors in buiding  vmxnet, have you experienced any problems with guest network, or it worked fine?

IMHO you can ignore these errors, they just mean that compatible drivers are already installed, updating them is not required?

Fedora already contains its own device drivers for Vmware, when you install it in a VM, they are already in place.

As we've seen, the confirure script is prepared to deal with failures to rebuild existing drivers, it is not a fatal error.

--pa

[gbohn]

> After you got these errors in buiding  vmxnet, have you experienced any problems

> with guest network, or it worked fine?

  I wasn't sure if I was getting slower performance or not. I had some 'slow' responses (in certain operations) over a VPN and was hoping the tools update would improve things.

  Since 'fixing' the compiler error, things are either the same or a little faster.

> Fedora already contains its own device drivers for Vmware,

  So I shouldn't install the VMWare tools at all then (for Fedora 13)?

      -Greg

[pavel-a]

> So I shouldn't install the VMWare tools at all then (for Fedora 13)?

If you install Fedora thru VMWare "easy install", it will install Tools automagically.

Otherwise I guess every modern Linux version knows about VMWare and has drivers for its virtual hardware - but not complete Tools.

Tools may contain updates for these drivers.

Regards,

-- pa

[gbohn]

> If you install Fedora thru VMWare "easy install", it will install Tools automagically.

  I don't think I used the 'Easy' install. (I once made the mistake of using 'easy install' for Windows. I found it made the 'wrong' decisions for what I wanted... Maybe I just need to find out more about how to control what it does, but ever since then I've shyed away from using it)

    -Greg

[gbohn]

Just a quick update. It looks like I've found a problem with the solution I used.

  Using the 'fixed' VMware tools vmxnet module seems to work o.k. except for hibernate.

  It looks like I can select 'hibernate' from the Fedora Guest o.k. But, the bridged network (eth0 in the guest) is missing after I power the hibernated guest system back on (even after waiting a while).

  (I would have used 'sleep', but this choice was not presented by Fedora).

  Going back to the 'original' 7.1.4 tools (where vmxnet gets a compiler error) and the Guest network appears to come back after I power back on.

   -Greg