How To Install VMware Player On Ubuntu

VMware Player is a freeware virtualization software package from VMware, Inc which enables the user to run virtual appliances on the host machine. From the version 3.0, VMware Player can also create virtual machines, versions earlier than 3.0.0 of VMware Player were unable to create virtual machines, requiring the user to download pre-created virtual appliances or create machines for use in Player with the full VMware Workstation.

For Ubuntu and various Linux distributions, there is a open-source alternative available i.e Sun Microsystems’s VirtualBox which exactly does the same task that VMware Player does. O.K we will not cover that now in this post.
Installing VMware Player in Linux system is quiet tricky unlike installing in Windows machine as there are various dependencies that needs to be suffice before installing VMware Player on your Linux host. The main dependencies are listed below;
1. Linux Header Files
2. Linux Latest Kernel Files

Step 1 : So to install these dependencies first, fire up the terminal in your Ubuntu by pressing the key combination of Ctrl+Alt+T.

Step 2 : Copy the below command as it is and paste in the terminal;

sudo apt-get install build-essential linux-headers-$(euname -r)

Step 3 : The above command will install all the packages necessary for our VMware Player installation. Now head towards the VMware homepage and download the latest VMware Player setup for your Linux system, make sure you are downloading the correct version in respective of your operating system i.e 32bit or 64bit.

At the time of writing this post, the latest version of VMware Player available is VMware-player-3.1.3-324285.

Step 4: Once you have finished downloading the VMware Player setup, right click on it and click on ‘Properties’. In the opened dialogue box, click on the ‘Permissions tab’. In that tab tick the checkbox in front of ‘Execute’ as shown in the below image. Ticking the checkbox allows you to execute the file as program.

Step 5: In the same folder where the setup is downloaded, open the terminal and enter the below command to direct the system towards the setup file.

cd (path-of-the setup file) 

(you can obtain it by pressing the key combination of ‘Ctrl+L’)

Step 6: When you will be done with the step no. 5, open the terminal again and copy the below command into the terminal box.

sudo ./VMware-Player-3.1.3-324285.i386.bundle

If you are following my instructions as they were written then it should open the installer window as shown in the below image;

Step 7: Now go to ‘Applications’ then to ‘System Tools’ and you will find ‘VMware Player’ icon there, click on it to start the application;

Step 8: On the first start VMware Player will compile the kernel modules for its use, let it compile.Once done you will be presented with the VMware Player welcome window.

Step 9: If you have any existing Virtual machine you can open it by clicking ‘Open Virtual Machine’ icon or you could create new one by clicking on ‘Create a new virtual machine’ icon.

In this way we could install VMware Player on your Ubuntu system. Enjoy !