Unable to install vmware tools on my linux guest - where is linux.iso?

[meetom]

I have Fedora 9 running as my linux guest on ESXi 4.0. I can't install vmtools because the message "Unable to install VMware Tools. An error occurred while trying to access image file '/usr/lib/vmware/isoimages/linux.iso' needed to install VMware Tools." See attached screenshot. I SSH into my ESXi 4.0 host and sure enough it doesn't. Any help would be much appreciated.

Here's my directory listings.

~ # pwd

/

~ # ls -l

l----

---

0 root root 1984 Jan 1 1970 altbootbank -> /vmfs/volumes/761f9a72-667d553c-dcfd-956035abd31e

drwxr-xr-x 1 root root 512 Jun 30 22:29 bin

l----

---

0 root root 1984 Jan 1 1970 bootbank -> /vmfs/volumes/a0137970-06ac6a53-d485-2f39e714992c

drwxr-xr-x 1 root root 512 Jul 31 00:16 dev

drwxr-xr-x 1 root root 512 Jun 30 22:29 etc

drwxr-xr-x 1 root root 512 Jun 30 22:29 lib

-rwx------ 1 root root 8570 Jun 30 21:43 local.tgz

l----

---

0 root root 1984 Jan 1 1970 locker -> /store

drwxr-xr-x 1 root root 512 May 1 01:53 opt

drwxr-xr-x 1 root root 131072 Jul 31 00:16 proc

l----

---

0 root root 1984 Jan 1 1970 productLocker -> /locker/packages/4.0.0/

drwxr-xr-x 1 root root 512 Jun 30 22:29 sbin

l----

---

0 root root 1984 Jan 1 1970 scratch -> /vmfs/volumes/4a4a7180-6d998b3b-ca52-00e0814a004d

l----

---

0 root root 1984 Jan 1 1970 store -> /vmfs/volumes/efd8efe3-03bc1cbf-15e0-080efd9e7379

drwxrwxrwt 1 root root 512 Jul 17 20:28 tmp

drwxr-xr-x 1 root root 512 Jun 30 22:29 usr

drwxr-xr-x 1 root root 512 Jun 30 22:29 var

drwxr-xr-x 1 root root 512 Jun 30 22:29 vmfs

l----

---

0 root root 1984 Jan 1 1970 vmupgrade -> /locker/vmupgrade/

[admin]

Your ESXi filesystem and your Guest OS filesystem have no connection or relation to one another at all.

Can you outline the steps you did to install the VMware tools?

Rick Blythe

Social Media Specialist

VMware Inc.

[KEPete]

What is in your /usr/lib/vmware/isoimages/ directory? That gets setup by default when you install ESXi. That is where all of the vmtools iso images are for the various guest OSs. This is on your host and not your guest file system. If you have not turned on tech support mode already and enabled SSH for your host, please do so as it is helpful. and if you find that iso is missing from that path, you can extract it from the ESXi install disk as well.

[DSTAVERT]

This has been reported before where the tools partition doesn't get setup/installed. It could be from a bad install or ?? Try using the vSphere Host Update Utility that should have been installed when you installed the VI client. It was a choice so if you didn't install it reinstall the client and add the update utility. Run the update tool and "Check for patches" See whether it will detect something missing an add the tools. If that doesn't help you may need to reinstall ESXi.

[meetom]

I do have SSH enabled for my ESXi host. Here are the steps I follow to install VMware Tools

1. right click the Guest VM --> Guest --> Install/Upgrade VMware Tools

This was when I got the error message above

[meetom]

I was able to extra the linux.iso from the ESXi 4.0 disk. For those who wants to know, linux.iso resides within VMware-VMvisor-big-164009-x86_64.dd in the image.tgz on the disk. I sync it over to my ESXi host and ran the vmware-install.pl script. Everything is well now. My Vsphere client shows VMware Tools: OK.

Thanks

[DSTAVERT]

There are more tools than just the linux iso. They should reside in their own partition as part of the ESXi install. It should not be necessary to extract anything.