VMWare 15 Compatibility

[xsyourpal]

I have the exact same issue with VMWare based Linux Machine Ubuntu 18.04.4  on VMWare 15.5.1

Even the most basic examples from the tutorials and documentation do not work.   I have tried multiple times and given up.    I hope Sysprogs Support takes some time to run through their tutorials and examples themselves.

The following error comes up after the basic example module is run.  /proc example.

(gdb begin)
— GDB Session —
VisualKernel is licensed to=============
-file-exec-and-symbols “C:\\Program\ Files\ \(x86\)\\Sysprogs\\VisualKernel\\KernelTools\\amd64\\dummy\.elf”
=thread-group-added,id=”i1″
~”GNU gdb (GDB) 8.0.1\n”
~”Copyright (C) 2017 Free Software Foundation, Inc.\n”
~”License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html&gt;\nThis is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.\nThere is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law. Type \”show copying\”\nand \”show warranty\” for details.\n”
License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html&gt;
This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.
There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law. Type “show copying”
and “show warranty” for details.
~”This GDB was configured as \”–host=i686-w64-mingw32 –target=x86_64-linux-gnu\”.\nType \”show configuration\” for configuration details.”
This GDB was configured as “–host=i686-w64-mingw32 –target=x86_64-linux-gnu”.
Type “show configuration” for configuration details.
~”\nFor bug reporting instructions, please see:\n”
~”<http://www.gnu.org/software/gdb/bugs/&gt;.\n”
~”Find the GDB manual and other documentation resources online at:\n<http://www.gnu.org/software/gdb/documentation/&gt;.\n”
Find the GDB manual and other documentation resources online at:
<http://www.gnu.org/software/gdb/documentation/&gt;.
~”For help, type \”help\”.\n”
~”Type \”apropos word\” to search for commands related to \”word\”.\n”
^done
-gdb-version
~”GNU gdb (GDB) 8.0.1\n”
~”Copyright (C) 2017 Free Software Foundation, Inc.\n”
~”License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html&gt;\nThis is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.\nThere is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law. Type \”show copying\”\nand \”show warranty\” for details.\n”
License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html&gt;
This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.
There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law. Type “show copying”
and “show warranty” for details.
~”This GDB was configured as \”–host=i686-w64-mingw32 –target=x86_64-linux-gnu\”.\nType \”show configuration\” for configuration details.”
This GDB was configured as “–host=i686-w64-mingw32 –target=x86_64-linux-gnu”.
Type “show configuration” for configuration details.
~”\nFor bug reporting instructions, please see:\n”
~”<http://www.gnu.org/software/gdb/bugs/&gt;.\n”
~”Find the GDB manual and other documentation resources online at:\n<http://www.gnu.org/software/gdb/documentation/&gt;.\n”
Find the GDB manual and other documentation resources online at:
<http://www.gnu.org/software/gdb/documentation/&gt;.
~”For help, type \”help\”.\n”
~”Type \”apropos word\” to search for commands related to \”word\”.\n”
^done
-list-features
^done,features=[“frozen-varobjs”,”pending-breakpoints”,”thread-info”,”data-read-memory-bytes”,”breakpoint-notifications”,”ada-task-info”,”language-option”,”info-gdb-mi-command”,”undefined-command-error-code”,”exec-run-start-option”]
-gdb-set disassembly-flavor intel
^done
-gdb-set print demangle off
^done
info target
&”info target\n”
~”Symbols from \”C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Sysprogs\\VisualKernel\\KernelTools\\amd64\\dummy.elf\”.\n”
^done

— Linux —
VisualKernel has hooked printk() and will display its output in this window.
You can disable this in VisualKernel Project Properties.

[support]

Unfortunately, VMWare 15 no longer contains the VIX API used by VisualKernel to restart the virtual machine in order to modify its configuration. As a workaround, please follow the steps below to enable debugging of a VMWare 15 machine:

1. Suspend or stop the VM. Make sure it is no longer running.
2. Add the following lines to the vmx file (replace guest64 with guest32 if you are running a 32-bit kernel):

   debugStub.listen.guest64 = 1
   debugStub.listen.guest64.remote = "TRUE"
   debugStub.hideBreakpoints = "FALSE"

3. Start the VM. Make sure the VM log file contains the following lines:

   2020-01-28T10:25:40.627-08:00| vmx| W115: Debug stub: VMware Workstation is listening for debug connection on port 8864.
   2020-01-28T10:25:40.627-08:00| vmx| W115: Debug stub:     (gdb) target remote <host running VM>:8864
   2020-01-28T10:25:40.627-08:00| vmx| W115: Debug stub:     (lldb) gdb-remote <host running VM>:8864

As long as the “target remote” line is present in the log file, VisualKernel will be able to automatically connect to the virtual machine.

We are working on supporting the new JSON-based VMWare API and will make sure that the upcoming VisualKernel 3.2 will handle this automatically and won’t require any manual configuration editing.

[support]

Update: to make it less confusing while we are working on supporting the new JSON API, we have released VisualKernel 3.1R3 that will detect the cases when the VIX API is missing and will prompt to suspend and then resume the VM manually. It will still edit the configuration files automatically, minimizing the amount of extra steps.

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