But that's what I did because I was in a hurry and I figured Ubuntu was a safe bet. That's the distribution VMware chose to build its browser appliance with, so if anything was going to have the right configuration for a smooth install, it was going to be Ubuntu. I was right about that — the installation went fine. Much to my chagrin, however, after I updated my system later, the Player decided not to start up anymore. I did get things working properly after downloading and installing gcc and the right headers version. It took me a while to determine the problem, though, and that's a problem — but I won't go on a rant about how my desire to use Linux 100% of the time is often thwarted by the fact that I do not have at my disposal the spare hours to devote to things like researching unsatisfied dependencies and mismatched headers.