SRU: vmware-user doesn't autostart

[Adar Dembo]

The version of open-vm-tools in Intrepid includes a vmware-user.desktop file that is intended to automatically start vmware-user on login, but it doesn’t work because the file is missing the line Type=Application.

This line is already present in the Jaunty package. The attached debdiff (comment 2) adds a dpatch to add this line for Intrepid. This allows vmware-user to autostart correctly.

This debdiff also fixes bug #289921 “network interface does not come up after installing open-vm-tools” and bug #306835 “vvmware-guestd crashing”, and descriptions of the corresponding patches are posted there.

The patched package has been in my PPA for four weeks, and confirmed working by three other users. Risk of regression is low, especially given that these three bugs essentially prevent the current Intrepid package from being useful in any way.

===

Binary package hint: open-vm-toolbox

There's a small bug in the vmware-user.desktop file supplied with the open-vm-toolbox package such that the application doesn't automatically start when a new X11 session is started. The details can be found in the upstream bug repository: http://sourceforge.net/tracker/index.php?func=detail&aid=2298353&group_id=204462&atid=989708.

The fix is trivial: add the line "Type=Application" to vmware-user.desktop (it doesn't matter where).

This is a bug in Intrepid, but not in Jaunty (I believe Jaunty resynced to upstream and picked up the upstream fix for the bug).

adar@adar-intrepid-vm:~$ lsb_release -rd
Description: Ubuntu 8.10
Release: 8.10

adar@adar-intrepid-vm:~$ apt-cache policy open-vm-toolbox
open-vm-toolbox:
  Installed: 2008.08.08-109361-1ubuntu1
  Candidate: 2008.08.08-109361-1ubuntu1
  Version table:
 *** 2008.08.08-109361-1ubuntu1 0
        500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com intrepid/multiverse Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

[Luis F. Lopez (luis.lopez)]

Bug was confirmed upstream and fixed in code refresh 2008.11.18

[Anders Kaseorg (andersk)]

Here is a debdiff for Intrepid that fixes this bug, along with bug #289921 and bug #306835. This package is also available in my PPA:
<https://launchpad.net/~anders-kaseorg/+archive/ppa>.

[William Cattey (wdc-mit)]

I have tested Anders' package under Intrepid.
It solves the problem of the failure of vmware-user to autostart.
I'd very much like to see this fix make it into Intrepid and Jaunty.
It's a one-line fix that takes us from, "You must start vmware-user by hand" to
vmware-user starts up automatically like it's supposed to.

[Alex Valavanis (valavanisalex)]

Intrepid Ibex reached end-of-life on 30 April 2010 so I am closing the
report. The bug has been fixed in newer releases of Ubuntu.