Failure to install VMware Tools: Cannot find the answer BINDIR in the installer database

Products

• VMware
• VMware Desktop Hypervisor
• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

• If a VMware Tools installation is stopped before it can set the BINDIR (which occurs after the first prompted question), the installer is stopped prematurely and displays this message:
  
  A previous installation of VMware Tools has been detected.
  The previous installation was made by the tar installer (version 4).
  Keeping the tar4 installer database format.
  You have a version of VMware Tools installed. Continuing this install will
  first uninstall the currently installed version. Do you wish to continue?
  (yes/no) [yes]
   
• If you select yes, you see the error:
  
  Error: Unable to find the binary installation directory (answer BINDIR)
  in the installer database file "/etc/vmware-tools/locations".
  Uninstall failed. Please correct the failure and re run the install.
  Execution aborted.

Environment

VMware Workstation 11.x (for Windows)
VMware Workstation 10.x (Windows)
VMware Workstation 7.x (Windows)
VMware Workstation 8.x (Windows)
VMware Fusion 8.x
VMware Workstation Player 14.x (Windows)
VMware Fusion 6.x
VMware Player 3.x (Linux)
VMware Player 7.x (Linux)
VMware ACE 2.6.x
VMware Player Pro 7.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation 9.x (Windows)
VMware Workstation Player 12.x (Windows)
VMware Player 6.x (Linux)
VMware Player 5.x (Linux)
VMware Fusion 5.x
VMware Workstation 11.x (for Linux)
VMware Workstation Pro 12.x (Windows)
VMware Workstation Player 14.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation 10.x (Linux)
VMware Player Pro 7.x (Windows)
VMware Fusion Pro 8.x
VMware Workstation Player 12.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation 9.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation 7.x (Linux)
VMware Player 4.x (Windows)
VMware Player 7.x (Windows)
VMware Player 4.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation Pro 12.x (Linux)
VMware Workstation 8.x (Linux)
VMware Player 3.x (Windows )
VMware Fusion 10.x
VMware Player 5.x (Windows)
VMware Fusion 3.x
VMware Player 6.x (Windows)
VMware Fusion Pro 10.x
VMware Workstation Pro 14.x (for Linux)
VMware Fusion 7.x
VMware ACE 2.7.x
VMware Fusion 4.x
VMware Workstation Pro 14.x (for Windows)

Resolution

To resolve this issue, remove the /etc/vmware-tools/locations file and reinstall VMware Tools.

 

To remove the /etc/vmware-tools/locations file and reinstall VMware Tools:

1. Open a terminal. For more information, see Opening a command or shell prompt (1003892)
2. Run the command:
   
   rm -f /etc/vmware-tools/locations
    
3. Reinstall VMware tools.

Additional Information

For translated versions of this article, see:

• 日本語: VMware Tools をインストールできない: インストーラ データベースに応答 BINDIR が見つかりません (2095217)
• 简体中文: 无法安装 VMware Tools：在安装程序数据库中找不到应答 BINDIR (2101470)