Installing the deployPkg plug-in in a Linux virtual machine with open- vm-tools version lower than 9.10

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

This article provides steps for installing the deployPkg plug-in in a Linux virtual machine. This KB article is applicable to open-vm-tools 9.4.x only.

 

Note:

open-vm-tools version 9.10.0 and later includes the functionality provided by open-vm-tools-deploypkg and there is no need to install this additional package. open-vm-tools-deploypkg will conflict with open-vm-tools 9.10.0 and later therefore it should be uninstalled before upgrading to open-vm-tools 9.10.0 or later.

 

Environment

VMware vSphere ESXi 8.0
VMware vSphere ESXi 7.0
VMware vSphere ESXi 6.x
VMware vSphere ESXi 5.x

Resolution

With open-vm-tools version 9.10 and later, the following steps are not needed. To determine the version of open-vm-tools installed, run this command:

vmware-toolbox-cmd -v

If you are using the virtual machine as a template or SRM (Site Recovery Manager) to customize virtual machines after fail over, then install the deployPkg Tools plug-in.

Note: If you are using RHEL7 minimal or CentOS7 minimal, Perl must be installed for customization to function.

To install this plug-in in RHEL7:

1. Obtain and import the VMware Packaging Public Keys:
    
   1. Create a directory on the virtual machine to store the VMware Packaging Public Keys.
   2. Download all the VMware Public Packaging Public Keys from the https://packages.vmware.com/tools/legacykeys/ directory.
   3. Save the key files to the directory you created.
   4. For each key that you download, run this command to import the key:
      
      # rpm --import /key_path/key_name
      
      Where key_path is the directory in which you saved the keys and key_name is the file name of a key.

 

1. Create a file /etc/yum.repos.d/vmware-tools.repo with this content:
   
   [vmware-tools]
   name = VMware Tools
   baseurl = https://packages.vmware.com/packages/6.3.0/rhel7/x86_64/
   enabled = 1
   gpgcheck = 1

 

1. To install the package, run this command:
   
   $ sudo yum install open-vm-tools-deploypkg
    
2. To reload the plug-in, restart running this command:
   
   sudo systemctl restart vmtoolsd

To install this plug-in in Ubuntu:

1. To obtain and import the VMware Packaging Public Keys:
    
   1. Create a directory on the virtual machine to store the VMware Packaging Public Keys.
   2. Download all the VMware Public Packaging Public Key files from the https://packages.vmware.com/tools/legacykeys/ directory.
   3. Save the files to the directory you created.
   4. For each key that you download, run this command to import the key:
      
      $ sudo apt-key add /key_path/key_name
      
      Where key_path is the directory in which you saved the keys and key_name is the file name of a key.

 

1. Create the file /etc/apt/sources.list.d/vmware-tools.list with this content:
   
    https://packages.vmware.com/packages/

 

1. To install the package, run this command:
   
   $ sudo apt-get update
   $ sudo apt-get install open-vm-tools-deploypkg

Note : The ubuntu installation is no longer functional, at least for ubuntu 12.04

To install this plug-in in SLES 12:

1. Create and edit the VMware zypper repository:
    
   1. Add the Yum-style repository as a zypper service.
   2. Type the entire command:
      
      # zypper addservice
      --type=YUM https://packages.vmware.com/packages/sle12/x86_64/ vmware-packages              
   3. Verify the repository configuration:
      
      # zypper packages vmware-packages
2. To install the package, run this command:
   
   # zypper install open-vm-tools-deploypkg
3. To restart open-vm-tools, run this command:
   
   sudo systemctl restart vmtoolsd

Deploy Pkg plugin for Libmspack0 required packages:

• libmspack
• open-vm-tools-deploypkg

Manual install deployPkg plugin:

• Access the URL https://packages.vmware.com/packages/ , and download package libmspack0 and open-vm-tools-deploypkg according to your Guest OS and release version.
• Install these 2 packages in Guest OS
• To install this plug-in in RHEL7 and SLES 12:

# rpm -ivh libmspack0-<version>

# rpm -ivh open-vm-tools-deploypkg-<version>

• To install this plug-in in Ubuntu:

# dpkg -i libmspack0-<version>

# dpkg -i open-vm-tools-deploypkg-<version>

​

 

Note: Guest OS Customization on Fedora 17 is not supported.

For more information, see VMware Tools Installation Guide For Operating System Specific Packages.