vmware player builds don't work on currently supported versions

[mwhooker]

the vmware player builder needs a couple of tools, including vmrun. According to this thread, vmrun was deprecated in version 12. It may be possible to get it running with VIX api libraries.

We should either figure out how to get builds to run with the currently available player, or refuse to run with a useful error message if the wrong version of player is installed.

See:
#1102
#4503
and reverted commit c5ec92c

[mwhooker]

curious to hear if anyone's gotten this to work with player >= 12 and vix libraries

[elatov]

I was recently able to kind of getting it working. Here is a draft of my notes:

https://github.com/elatov/elatov.github.io/blob/master/_posts/2018-11-16-use-packer-with-vmware-player-to-build-an-ova.md

[rgarrigue]

Tried to get it working under Windows 7 (no real choice here), didn't worked out.

I'm building centos6 using https://github.com/chef/bento with packer 1.3.0, VMware-player-14.1.3-9474260, VMware-VIX-1.17.0-6661328 and qemu-img 2.3.0.

I had to workaround netmap.conf like @elatov, on Windows the file gotta be created in C:\ProgramData\VMware\netmap.conf. Got another issue with VNC unable to connect, I solved it with a --var="headless=true", this is most likely bento's specific.

I'm stuck at

==> vmware-iso: Step "StepRun" failed, aborting...
Build 'vmware-iso' errored: unexpected EOF

[desmondgc]

At least adding a note in the docs saying that it probably doesn't work on recent VMware versions would save people from wasting time trying to troubleshoot like I did.

[cyrus104]

My environment has upgraded to VMware Workstation 15 and I haven't been able to get it working from a Linux host.

[nywilken]

My environment has upgraded to VMware Workstation 15 and I haven't been able to get it working from a Linux host.

Hi @cyrus104 is the issue you running into with VMware Player or VMware Workstation 15 on a Linux host? If its Workstation please open a new issue here with the respective logs PACKER_LOG=1 PACKER_LOG_PATH=out.log packer build build.json and a redacted build configuration so we can see what might be going on. I'm currently working with VMware Workstation 15 on Debian so I might be able to help you out.

[nqb]

Hello @nywilken,

I'm on Debian too (Buster) and try to build using vmware-iso, what is your current setup ?
If I installed VMware-Player-15.5.2-15785246.x86_64.bundle, I don't have any vmware or vmrun binary.

I'm unable to install successfully VMware-Player-14.1.7-12989993.x86_64.bundle on my Debian buster (the more recent bundle with a VMware-VIX bundle associated)

[lebarsfa]

Issue #9044 might be related.
Otherwise, I am currently able to build https://github.com/eaksel/packer-Win2019 on Ubuntu 18.04 (itself a VMware virtual machine with vhv.enable="TRUE" in its .vmx, running on a Windows 10 host) with packer build -only=vmware-iso -on-error=ask win2019-core.json after following https://communities.vmware.com/t5/VMware-Workstation-Player/VMWARE-VIX-1-17-Error-at-installing/m-p/2825019/highlight/true#M36208.

[ghost]

This issue has been automatically migrated to hashicorp/packer-plugin-vmware#12 because it looks like an issue with that plugin. If you believe this is not an issue with the plugin, please reply to hashicorp/packer-plugin-vmware#12.

[ghost]

I'm going to lock this issue because it has been closed for 30 days ⏳. This helps our maintainers find and focus on the active issues.

If you have found a problem that seems similar to this, please open a new issue and complete the issue template so we can capture all the details necessary to investigate further.