Distribute VMware Tools Upgrade on
Windows
You can perform VMware Tools upgrade for virtual machines from the GuestStore
repository.
VMware provides VMware Tools content for
download with each new release of VMware Tools. Starting with VMware Tools releases
after 11.2.5, you can download the VMware Tools content from VMware website and
extract it under the GuestStore repository path. Among all VMware Tools versions
extracted in GuestStore repository, the latest version is selected by default for
subsequent upgrades unless overridden by a setting in the VMware Tools configuration
file.
By importing the VMware Tools content in
the GuestStore repository, you can schedule an automated VMware Tools upgrade at the
next reboot of the virtual machines. You can also trigger VMware Tools upgrade from
GuestStore repository for particular virtual machines through vSphere UI or API.
Triggering VMware Tools
upgrade from GuestStore repository using VMware Tools Toolbox command line is
not supported in this release.
GuestStore based VMware Tools upgrade is
installed as part of VMware Tools installation. This feature generates notification
to the logged-on user, if GuestStore repository has newer version of VMware Tools
and if VMware Tools upgrade needs a system restart to complete the upgrade
process.
There are multiple policies supported for
GuestStore based VMware Tools upgrade. In
tools.conf
following
setting can be used to configure the policy:[guestStoreUpgrade]
policy=manual
where,
"policy"
can
have one of the following values:- off
- Disables the GuestStore based VMware Tools upgrade in the guest.
- manual
- This is the default policy. This policy allows vSphere administrators to trigger VMware Tools upgrade from GuestStore repository using vSphere UI or API.
- If the virtual machine has VMware Tools upgrade policy configured to upgrade at powercycle (VMX settingtools.upgrade.policy = "upgradeAtPowerCycle"), the setting is applied when the GuestStore based VMware Tools upgrade feature is enabled. On first VMware Tools system service start after virtual machine powers on, VMware Tools system service queries the host side VMware Tools upgrade policy setting for the virtual machine. If the policy is set to upgrade at powercycle, a check for an upgrade of VMware Tools from the GuestStore repository is triggered automatically.When GuestStore based VMware Tools upgrade is enabled, the VMware Tools bundled with VMware ESXi host is not used including the VMware Tools images added to VMware ESXi host through vSphere Update Manager (VUM).
- powercycle
- Triggers VMware Tools upgrade from GuestStore repository right after guest OS boots up.
- This policy also allows vSphere administrators to trigger VMware Tools upgrade from GuestStore repository using vSphere UI or API.
By default, GuestStore based VMware Tools
upgrade picks the latest version of VMware Tools from GuestStore repository. This
behavior can be overridden by specifying a VMware Tools version for
"vmtools-version-key" setting. This setting defaults to
"vmtools"
which refers to the latest VMware Tools version in the GuestStore repository.For example, following setting restricts
VMware Tools upgrades from the GuestStore repository to version 11.2.5.
vmtools-version-key=vmtools-11.2.5