Cannot install the VMware Tools in a linux guest despite having the correct kernel headers installed.

e.g. Under Fedora Core 5 with matching kernel and kernel-devel:

rpm -qa | grep kernel

- kernel-2.6.17-1.2157_FC5
- kernel-devel-2.6.17-1.2157_FC5

Install the ESX3 VMware Tools on the ESX 2.5.X guest VM using either:

VMwareTools-3.0.0-27701.i386.rpm or
VMwareTools-3.0.0-27701.tar.gz

Another option, although unlikely to be supported by VMware is to use the vmware-tools-any-update patch from The Czech Technical University in Prague:

http://ftp.cvut.cz/vmware/

Current version is vmware-tools-any-update2.tar.gz

Downloads:
http://theether.net/download/VMware/VMwareTools-3.0.0-27701.i386.rpm
http://theether.net/download/VMware/VMwareTools-3.0.0-27701.tar.gz