VMware Tools

All virtual machines running on ITS Private Cloud are required to have VMware tools (or equivalent) installed and up-to-date.

What is VMware Tools?

VMware Tools is a suite of utilities that enhances the performance of the virtual machine’s OS and improves management of the virtual machine with optimized network, storage, and video drivers. Also it allows the systems to allocate CPU and Memory resources to VMs more reliably and efficiently. Although the guest operating system can run without VMware Tools, you lose important functionality and convenience.

Here are some of key benefits VMware Tools provide.

Efficient CPU/Memory Allocation
Optimized Network Adapter Drivers
Optimized Storage Drivers
Reliable advanced vSphere features such as High Availability, Distributed Resource Scheduler
Mouse & Video Acceleration on Guest OS

For more information about how to verify VMware Tools version on your VMs, refer to the following KB article Verify VMware Tools version.

VMware Knowledge Base Articles

Overview of VMware Tools - http://kb.vmware.com/kb/340
General VMware Tools installation instructions - http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1014294
Installing VMware Tools in a Windows virtual machine - http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1018377
Installing VMware Tools in an Ubuntu virtual machine - http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1022525
Installing VMware Tools in a Linux virtual machine using RPM - http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1018392
Installing VMware Tools in a Solaris virtual machine - http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1023956