Using the newest VMware tools (from VMware Workstation 10) with VMware Workstation 9.x
The last couple of month I had issues with my Kali Linux pentesting VM. After updating the kernel to 3.14 the VMware tools didn’t compile anymore. More precisely the HGFS (Shared Folders) kernel module didn’t compile. Since I’m using VMware Workstation 9 (and don’t want to upgrade - yet) I needed a way to get the newest version of the tools that fixed that issue.
After a little googeling I found the update site that hosts the newest additions for all VMware products.
http://softwareupdate.vmware.com/cds/vmw-desktop/ws/
The content we’re interested in can be found here: http://softwareupdate.vmware.com/cds/vmw-desktop/ws/10.0.2/1744117/linux/packages/
The files get delivered as so called “.component.tar” files - a custom format by VMware. To extract these files the open source tool “VMWare-Component-Extractor” by Nick Glynn can be used (a ready to use x64 binary can be found at the end of this post).
~$ VMWareComponentExtractor_x86-64 vmware-tools-linux-9.6.2-1744117.x86_64.component.tar
Since I had problems specifying relative paths to the component-file I suggest placing the file in the same folder as the binary. Afterwards the “linux.iso” file will be available in the same folder as the source file.
I mounted the ISO file in my VMware Workstation and updated the VMware tool package for my Kali Linux VM. After a reboot the HGFS (Share Folders) feature worked again flawlessly.
Binary and Source
I cloned the repository to be sure that it doesn’t vanish and provide the binary with the source.
Original Author:
Nick Glynn (17twenty) - Github: https://github.com/17twenty/VMWare-Component-Extractor
marpie
@markus_pieton