Many have been reporting problems when installing VMware Workstation 9 on Fedora 18 64 bit machines & on other distros using the newer kernel versions – 3.8* or newer. The installer reports of missing kernel header files & prompts for the same. Installing kernel-headers package does not work. This problem isn’t related to Fedora 18 but its due to Vmware guys not updating their vmware-config-tool for the new kernel releases. Before you go ahead to rectify the problem, I advise you update your kernel & its headers.
#yum update kernel* -y
#yum install kernel-headers kernel-devel -y
Reboot the system & boot into the new kernel. Fire up a shell & issue,
#uname -r
This will output you the current booted kernel version. Copy the entire line into the clipboard.
Now create a new directory at the following path,
#mkdir -p /lib/modules/your-kernel-version-here-from-above/build/include/linux/
It should look similar to,
#mkdir -p /lib/modules/3.9.5-201.fc18.x86_64/build/include/linux/
Now we need to copy the missing .h file to the location we just created. Issue,
cp usr/include/linux/version.h /lib/modules/3.9.5-201.fc18.x86_64/build/include/linux/
Now launch Vmware 9, if it still fails have a look at the pointed log file in the error prompt.
#cat /tmp/vmware-root/vmware-modconfig-3787.log
It should mostly indicate failure to build ‘vmci’ or ‘vmblock’. This is okay & one can ignore this. Hit cancel to quit the Vmware 9. Open a shell. We will now edit the vmware configuration file & disabled the entry which ensures ‘vmci’ or vmblock’ module is built & loaded.
#vi /etc/vmware/config
Find the line
VMCI_CONFED = “no” (It will be YES, make it as ‘no’)
This will cancel building of vmci module. Same can be done for vmblock.
VMBLOCK_CONFED = “no”
Now save & quit Vi editor issuing,
ESC key + :wq! + Enter Key
Now launch VMware 9 & it should launch normally. 🙂
