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VMware installation problem

Adegbolagun Adeola [adecisco_associate at yahoo.com]


Sun, 1 Mar 2009 06:07:04 -0800 (PST)

Hello Deividson

Can you help me to fix the problem below?. I actually interrupted vmware installation before trying to install it only to be requesting for the below:

I will appreciate you help

root@adey-laptop:/home/adey/Documents/vmware-server-distrib#               
./vmware-install.pl                                                        
A previous installation of VMware Server has been detected.                
 
The previous installation was made by the tar installer (version 4).       
 
Keeping the tar4 installer database format.                                
 
You have a product that conflicts with VMware Server installed.            
Continuing                                                                 
this install will first uninstall this product.  Do you wish to continue?  
(yes/no) [yes] y                                                           
 
Error: Unable to execute                                                   
"/media/DATA_DRIVE/Virtual-Machine-File/vmware-uninstall.pl.               
 
Uninstall failed.  Please correct the failure and re run the install.      
 
Execution aborted.                                                         

Thanks


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Ben Okopnik [ben at linuxgazette.net]


Sun, 1 Mar 2009 18:17:19 -0800

On Sun, Mar 01, 2009 at 06:07:04AM -0800, Adegbolagun Adeola wrote:

>    Hello Deividson                                                            

Hi there. As you may have guessed from the 'lists' part of the address, Deividson isn't the only person reading this email; in fact, there's a whole gang of us (The Answer Gang, that is.)

>    Can you help me to fix the problem below?. I actually interrupted vmware   
>    installation before trying to install it only to be requesting for the     
>    below:                                                                     
>                                                                               
>    I will appreciate you help                                                 
>                                                                               
>    root@adey-laptop:/home/adey/Documents/vmware-server-distrib#               
>    ./vmware-install.pl                                                        
>    A previous installation of VMware Server has been detected.                
>                                                                               
>    The previous installation was made by the tar installer (version 4).       
>                                                                               
>    Keeping the tar4 installer database format.                                
>                                                                               
>    You have a product that conflicts with VMware Server installed.            
>    Continuing                                                                 
>    this install will first uninstall this product.  Do you wish to continue?  
>    (yes/no) [yes] y                                                           
>                                                                               
>    Error: Unable to execute                                                   
>    "/media/DATA_DRIVE/Virtual-Machine-File/vmware-uninstall.pl.               
>                                                                               
>    Uninstall failed.  Please correct the failure and re run the install.      

What this says is that the VMware installer is looking for its installation data on some sort of an externally-mounted drive - one that's mounted under '/media/DATA_DRIVE'. I don't know why it expects this - perhaps your first attempt at installing VMware was from an external drive, and it left some configuration data as a result? - but your best option is to purge the current installation and to start completely from scratch.

As another possibility - one that may create problems, but may be necessary if you want to do this as a reinstall - you could either re-use the original data device (which will, presumably, mount in the same place with the same name), or - and this is somewhat contrived, but should work - you could make a symlink in the /media directory called DATA_DRIVE that points to /home/adey/Documents/vmware-server-distrib (or wherever your install data actually lives.) Re-run the installer, and make sure to delete the link afterwards.

Again, though, the first option - purging the old install and doing it fresh - is strongly preferred. That is, after all, the whole point of the package system - one of the major factors in the stability of Linux.

-- 
* Ben Okopnik * Editor-in-Chief, Linux Gazette * http://LinuxGazette.NET *


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Deividson Okopnik [deivid.okop at gmail.com]


Mon, 2 Mar 2009 11:39:40 -0300

> On Sun, Mar 01, 2009 at 06:07:04AM -0800, Adegbolagun Adeola wrote:
>>    Hello Deividson

Hello Adegbolagun

>>
>>    You have a product that conflicts with VMware Server installed.
>>    Continuing
>>    this install will first uninstall this product.  Do you wish to continue?
>>    (yes/no) [yes] y
>>
>>    Error: Unable to execute
>>    "/media/DATA_DRIVE/Virtual-Machine-File/vmware-uninstall.pl.
>>
>>    Uninstall failed.  Please correct the failure and re run the install.
>
> What this says is that the VMware installer is looking for its
> installation data on some sort of an externally-mounted drive -
> one that's mounted under '/media/DATA_DRIVE'. I don't know why it
> expects this - perhaps your first attempt at installing VMware was from
> an external drive, and it left some configuration data as a result? -
> but your best option is to purge the current installation and to start
> completely from scratch.

As Ben pointed, it looks like youre installing from a different location than last time, and thats confusing the installer, so it's not locating the uninstaller correctly. You can try to install from the old location, what will make the installer locate the un-installer correctly, or you can run the un-installer directly (vmware-uninstall.pl at your new installer folder)- whatever is easyer for you.


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