VMware Remote Console on EL 4, EL 5

When using VMware Server 2.0 on a CentOS host, one used to be able to connect to a virtual machine's console via VMware Remote Console Plug-in for Firefox. That is, while CentOS used to be equipped with Firefox 3.0. (See Also: ​http://www.vmwareforum.org/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1222353993) In June, 2010, web browsers in RHEL 4 and RHEL 5 were upgraded to Firefox 3.6.4, and the plug-in ceased to load properly.

One can use the VMware Remote Console Plug-in as a stand-alone application though.

• Locate the XPI file that corresponds to your operating system architecture.

$ rpm -q VMware-server
VMware-server-2.0.2-203138
$ rpm -ql VMware-server |grep vmrc
/usr/lib/vmware/webAccess/tomcat/apache-tomcat-6.0.16/webapps/ui/plugin/vmware-vmrc-linux-x64.xpi
/usr/lib/vmware/webAccess/tomcat/apache-tomcat-6.0.16/webapps/ui/plugin/vmware-vmrc-linux-x86.xpi
/usr/lib/vmware/webAccess/tomcat/apache-tomcat-6.0.16/webapps/ui/plugin/vmware-vmrc-win32-x86.exe
/usr/lib/vmware/webAccess/tomcat/apache-tomcat-6.0.16/webapps/ui/plugin/vmware-vmrc-win32-x86.xpi
$

• Uncompress the XPI archive in an appropriate directory (one listed in your PATH).

$ cd ~/bin
$ mkdir vmware-vmrc-linux-x86
$
$ cd vmware-vmrc-linux-x86
$ unzip -q /usr/lib/vmware/webAccess/tomcat/apache-tomcat-6.0.16/webapps/ui/plugin/vmware-vmrc-linux-x86.xpi
$ ls -log
total 16
drwxr-xr-x  2 4096 Oct 10  2008 components
-rw-r--r--  1 1677 Oct 10  2008 install.js
-rw-r--r--  1 1242 Oct 10  2008 install.rdf
drwxr-xr-x  7 4096 Oct 10  2008 plugins
$ cd ..
$
$ ln -s vmware-vmrc-linux-x86/plugins/vmware-vmrc .
$

• Run the application first by specifying full (or relative) path.

$ ~/bin/vmware-vmrc
Configuring libraries for first use
Configured /home/username/bin/vmware-vmrc-linux-x86/plugins/libconf/etc/fonts/fonts.dtd
Configured /home/username/bin/vmware-vmrc-linux-x86/plugins/libconf/etc/fonts/fonts.conf
Configured /home/username/bin/vmware-vmrc-linux-x86/plugins/libconf/etc/fonts/local.conf
Configured /home/username/bin/vmware-vmrc-linux-x86/plugins/libconf/etc/pango/pangorc
Configured /home/username/bin/vmware-vmrc-linux-x86/plugins/libconf/etc/pango/pangox.aliases
Configured /home/username/bin/vmware-vmrc-linux-x86/plugins/libconf/etc/pango/pango.modules
Configured /home/username/bin/vmware-vmrc-linux-x86/plugins/libconf/etc/gtk-2.0/gdk-pixbuf.loaders
Configured /home/username/bin/vmware-vmrc-linux-x86/plugins/libconf/etc/gtk-2.0/gtkrc
Configured /home/username/bin/vmware-vmrc-linux-x86/plugins/libconf/etc/gtk-2.0/gtk.immodules
Configured /home/username/bin/vmware-vmrc-linux-x86/plugins/libconf/etc/gtk-2.0/Clearlooks.gtkrc
Configuration successful
$

• To connect to a console of a virtual machine running on a VMware Server host use the following command.

$ vmware-vmrc -h server-hostname:8333 -u username

• When connecting to a console of a virtual machine running on a ESX host one can omit a port number.

$ vmware-vmrc -h esx-hostname -u username