[KLUG Members] VMware from remote?

[Adam Williams]

>>On the workstation I can 
>>"vmware -X /usr/local/vmware/win32/NT4/3/winNT.cfg" and the instance boots 
>>and runs in full screen mode without any fuss,  I only have to look at the 
>>VMware window for a couple of seconds.  Then Ctrl-Alt-F3 is WinNT and 
>>Ctrl-Alt-F4 is GNOME (Ctrl-Alt-F1/F2 are console screens).  I have the 
>>best of all worlds.  (And occasionally Ctrl-Alt-F5 is a web server, and 
>>Ctrl-Alt-F6 is a middle tier server, while Ctrl-Alt-F7 is a database 
>>server.  This is great stuff,  Hey, where did all the RAM go!!!).
>>Anyway the "problem" is that one has to have a $DISPLAY for all this work.  
>>I'd like to logout of the NT instance and out of GNOME while leaving the 
>>NT instance (or others) running.  Especially since I can access the NT 
>>instance via VNC.  Ideally I'd like to be able to ssh into the workstation 
>>and start an instance.
>>I anyone has an ideas how to whack VMware's UI or simply fake-it-out,  I'm 
>>all ears.
>I have an idea or two, but I'm a little confused on what you're doing
>now.  When I start vmware in full screen mode with the "-X", just
>pressing CTRL-ALT brings it out of full screen mode, back to a window. 

Hmm, I've never done that.  Running full screen the guest OS just takes
the next available VC,  and the next, the next, etc...  You Ctrl-Alt-Fn
between them just like between "normal" VCs.  I didn't "do" anything, 
not that I recall anyway.  I pretty much assumed it worked that way, 
and it does,  so I got lucky for once.

I find the OS in a window a little annoying, with mouse focus, etc...  I
like to have all my guests on seperate VCs.  I can always telnet/ssh/vnc
to them from my GNOME session using native GNOMEy applications.

>How do you get in the "Fn" key to switch to a different console/X-screen
>and keep vmware in full screen mode?

It just happened (I think).

>Also, can you be more specific on exactly how your starting vmware?
>(setting the display, starting another occurrence of X, ...)

I'm stating the vmware instance from within GNOME using a task bar
icon.  Each guest has it's own icon.  So DISPLAY is already set, etc...

What I want to do is start an instance without having to create and/or
maintain an X/DISPLAY session.  Once it is full-screen I don't think the
instance needs X anymore,  but the VMware control thingy seems to.