F10, VMware Server 2.0, and selinux

[Gilboa Davara]

On Mon, Dec 15, 2008 at 10:49 PM, Christopher A. Williams
<chriswfedora at cawllc.com> wrote:
> >
> > A. I was unaware of the vmware-update-2.6.27-5.5.7-2 patch. Last time I
> > checked (~1.5 months ago) only the any-to-any patch was available and it
> > didn't support kernels >= 2.6.26.
> > B. Much like the any-to-any patch, (and at least according to google)
> > this patch is unofficial.
> > C. As I previously said, -officially-, VMWare doesn't support Fedora.
> > [1]
> > D. As you recall, the OP asked if can send a BZ about his SELinux
> > problems in bugzilla.redhat.com - my original answer was rather simple:
> > VMware is proprietary and closed source, and doesn't officially support
> > Fedora.
> >
> > [1] VMWare server, user's guide, page 26.
>
> As the OP, I would say your response was a little touchier than that.
> Moreover, it did not even approach being helpful. In the context I
> originally asked, it doesn't matter that VMware doesn't officially
> support Fedora. If it were, I would have escalated it with VMware,
> especially since I have access to special support that many who use
> VMware don't.

My answer might have been too aggressive - Sorry for that.
However, I've already tried contacting VMware concerning their
problematic Fedora / upstream support (Either using their Forums [as a
private client] and as an enterprise user) and in both cases, their
the people that I spoke with gave me the company line - read: RHEL and
SLES only.

> Lots of stuff, both open source and proprietary, isn't supported on
> Fedora by their respective vendors, but that doesn't stop people on the
> Fedora team from figuring out how to make it work. That also goes for
> VMware. I also know that they would be interested in documenting a fix
> for this problem.

Problem is - I'm not sure that we should - and I'm not talking about
the close vs. open source problem.
Seems to me that VMWare is treating Linux users (especially non
RHEL/SLES users) as free-loaders.
E.g.
- VMware's refusal to issue official vmnet/vmmon kernel driver patches
(as opposed to the 3'rd party any-to-any patches).
- Broken RPMs (Missing reqs) that are being ignored.
- GTK hacks in their console, that semi-work on anything >= Fedora 8.
- VMWare's VI client is Windows only. Want Linux host? Use the (@#%@%)
web client.
- etc.
I don't really like VirtualBox - but compare VBOX's Fedora support to
VMWare's (Specific RPM for each Fedora release), and you'll understand
my point.

Last and not least, the OP (at least the message I saw) was talking
about VMWare Server 2.x which had a known issue with PAM [1] and
SELinux (...) that didn't really seem to get VMWare's attention.
When I tried getting support (mind you, at the time we were thinking
about spending a lot of money on ESX - for me the VMWare Server 2.x
deployment was just testing purpose) - I got the ever-annoying-company
line - we only support RHEL and SLES....


> The original question was if anyone on the Fedora team knew of status of
> any potential fix (BZ or not - but I didn't mention BZ). Fortunately,
> someone does care enough to look into it (thanks Daniel Walsh).

I missed the OM. I only saw the one that I answered to.

> I'll send what I find with F10 and the latest Server 2.0 build this
> weekend...

Well, as you understand, my experience with


- Gilboa
[1] http://tommi.org/2008/09/vmware-server-20-and-fedora-9/