VMware Server can create, edit, and play virtual machines. It uses a client-server model, allowing remote access to virtual machines, at the cost of some graphical performance (and 3D support). In addition to the ability to run virtual machines created by other VMware products, it can also run virtual machines created by Microsoft Virtual PC.

1. Install required packages

apt-get install psmisc make gcc gcc-4.1 linux-headers-$(uname -r)

2. Download VMware server

Register at vmware.com, download the latest VMware server binary and upload to your server.

This has been tested on Debian lenny running on VMware server 2.0.

Install kernel headers and some tools used to install VMware tools:

apt-get install binutils cpp gcc make psmisc linux-headers-$(uname -r)

Mount the cdrom drive. Make sure you have mounted the VMware tools virtual cd from the host before moving on.

mount /dev/cdrom /mnt/

Extract VMware tools to the tmp directory:

tar -C /tmp -zxvf /mnt/VMwareTools-x.x.x.tar.gz