Open-vm-tools causes parrot to break

If have installed the most recent version of parrot as of april 2019 on a optimus laptop using an usb and not a virtual machine with debian GTK. There are no other operating systems installed. The first thing i did after the install is running the sudo parrot-upgrade in the MATE-terminal. The update runs smoothly until reaches 72% when it installs open-vm-tools. Suddenly my laptop freezes. I push the power-button to turn my laptop off. When I start it up again, parrot is completely broken. (as shown in the image).blob:file:///865821c3-0456-43a3-94ce-98c43ea9fbb5 Why does this happen and how do I fix it. I think parrot has a bug. Does anyone else have this problem and I how do I fix it?!

I used rufus to burn Parrot on a different laptop, settings shown in the image
image|334x500
version of parrot: Parrot-security-4.5.1_amd64

Theres nothing wrong with open-vm-tools if the laptop seems frozen give it a while it usually just needs time and a lot resources, this may happen for some packages.
2. If for any reason an apt process doesnt finish use dpkg --configure -a will finish configuring and installing those pkg’s that have been downloaded

I have tested parrot on a different laptop. Same thing happened. It took a while and it didn’t unfreeze. My only option was to turn my laptop and the kernel broke again. I also tested this in a vm. Same thing happened. The only conclusion is that is caused by parrot, probably a bug and this needs to be resolved. Its no use trying dpkg --configure -a, because parrot completely freezes.

Thank you for your input.

I have a solution that bypasses the open-vm-tools installation. It does not solve the issue. However, it does prevent open-vm-tools from installing and thus prevents parrot from breaking.

Here is what i did:

sudo apt-mark hold open-vm-tools
sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade -y reboot

I want to use virtual machines in the future, so I need to install open-vm-tools. However, until they fixed open-vm-tools, I will refrain myself from doing so.

Hi @Crystal_Meth,

Have you tried running sudo parrot-upgrade after you held back the open-vm-tools package? I thought I had some issues when installing a while back as well. My installation would appear to freeze when updating the man-db, but I let it sit for a while and eveything installed without issue.

I tried, however the same thing happenend. I am going to try your solution in a virtual machine. Maybe it is fixed now. I will notify you as soon as I am done. I will test this on a different laptop.

I think the issue might be related to the way you created the live media. Parrot recommends using Etcher to create the USB media. If you have time, I would suggest using Etcher to recreate the USB media. I had very similar issues with the installation freezing when using dd to create the USB media with Parrot 4.5.1.

I used rufus on windows 10 to create USB-installation media. I have tested the installation of the open-vm-tools before on a virtual machine with parrot OS. The same thing happened. I do not think for that reason that the usb-media creator is the cause of the issue. Also it is only the open-vm-tools package that is problamatic, everything else works fine. Thank you for your input.

Based on what you’ve described, it does seem related to the open-vm-tools package and not the installation. If you have time though, it might be worth a shot to create the USB media with Etcher. It’s free and available for Windows machines. Good luck though, if you find a solution, please let the community know. Thanks!

I will give your solution a shot! Thank you. I shall notify if it worked.

I used sudo parrot-upgrade in a virtual machine using parrot os. It worked!
After that test I ran the following commands on my parrot os boot:

sudo apt-mark unhold open-vm-tools
sudo parrot-upgrade

It installed perfectly without freezing!

Glad you were able to get everything up and running!

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