Create init script for VMware tools

03 Jun 2015

I installed RHEL 6 on VMware ESXi 5.1 and after installing VMware tools, the installer did not add an init script for VMware tools. Which means service vmware-tools whatever will return unrecognized service. VMware has a KB article which tells us to use their own script but does not tell us how to create an init script.

Thankfully, this gentleman has the recipe and if you need to repeat it, here’s a quick script.

# Create init script for VMware tools if it does not exist
# http://klovsjo.free.fr/?p=70

if [[ ! -e /etc/init.d/vmware-tools ]]
then
        cp /etc/vmware-tools/services.sh /etc/init.d/vmware-tools
        sed -i 's/##VMWARE_INIT_INFO##/# Basic support for IRIX style chkconfig\n# chkconfig: 235 03 99\n# description: Manages the services needed to run VMware software\n/' /etc/init.d/vmware-tools
        chkconfig --add vmware-tools
        chkconfig vmware-tools on
fi