Here is a quick-start guide for running Mir in VMware:
- Go to https://my.vmware.com/web/vmware/downloads and download VMware Player (last in Desktop & End-User Computing section).
- Install VMware player with: sudo bash VMware-Player-<VERSION>.x86_64.bundle
- Get the latest vivid daily iso (not the unity-next iso!).
- Install vivid into VM, restart and log in.
- Install VMware tools from the menu "Virtual Machine->Install VMWare tools" and follow the instructions. If you get an error "VMware Tools installation cannot be started manually while the easy install is in progress see [1].
- If you are using Mesa drivers, stop the virtual machine, go to the folder where the VM is saved and add the following line to the <vm-name>.vmx file there:
mks.gl.allowBlacklistedDrivers = "TRUE"
- Restart the VM, log in and try glmark2 to ensure it shows 'SVGA' as the GL renderer (not 'llvmpipe'!):
$ sudo apt-get install glmark2
$ glmark2
- sudo apt-get unity8-desktop-session-mir mir-demos
- Try out a demo mir server:
- Change to VT2 and run "sudo mir_proving_server"
- Change to VT3 and run "sudo mir_demo_client_egltriangle"
- Change back to VT2, you should see a window with a triangle spinning fast
- Use Alt + click + drag to move the window around
- Use Ctrl-Alt-Backspace to stop the server
- Try out the unity8 desktop session by selecting it in lightdm
Unfortunately the VMware KMS support is still somewhat unstable. The KMS/DRM driver doesn't seem to respect vsync (hence the fast spinning egl triangle in step 9c). Also switching between VTs may occasionally make the VM unresponsive, and sometimes screen resizing causes problems. I strongly suggest you set up an ssh server in the VM so you can inspect the system over ssh from the host.
[1] http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=1017687