Advice, Tips, and Tricks

Obtaining Manjaro

Download your ISO and checksum.
VMware can run installation files (ISOs) directly as virtual discs, so there is no need to burn them to an installation medium such as a disc or USB data stick.

Creating your Virtual Machine

Start VMware.
When you select Create a New Virtual Machine, a New Virtual Machine Wizard Dialogue box should appear.
Select I will install the operating system later. and click Next.
Select your Guest Operating System Linux, and Version Other Linux 3.x kernel or Other Linux 3.x kernel 64-bit and click Next.
If desired, rename your Virtual Machine and change its location. Then, click Next.
Specify Disk Capacity (note that the default of 8GB is almost certainly too small). For better performance, Store virtual disk as a single file, but to save space, Split virtual disk into multiple files. Then, click Next.
Customize Hardware
- Memory: Increase from the default of 384MB to 2GB (for 64-bit Manjaro KDE)
- New CD/DVD: Change from the default of Use Physical Drive to Use ISO Image file, and point to your ISO.
- Display: Uncheck Accelerate 3D Graphics
Then, Close the Hardware window, and click Finish.
Then, click Play virtual machine.
After Manjaro boots, you will enter the live environment and you can select one of the installation options from the Manjaro Welcome.
The process to install any Guest operating system - including Manjaro - is exactly the same as if actually installing for real on your computer.
After installation, you may want to Edit Virtual Machine Settings and remove the ISO from the CD/DVD.

VMware Tools

Note

Manjaro will already have open-vm-tools pre-installed, so there is no need to add it yourself.

The Open Virtual Machine Tools (open-vm-tools) are the open source implementation of VMware Tools. They are special software packages designed to improve the performance and usability of the guest operating systems. They are installed within the Guest operating system itself, and most notably result in enhancing the display resolution, as well as enabling much better control over the mouse. As such, two tell-tale signs that they have not been installed in a Guest are that the display will not scale to the size of the display window (i.e. it will be necessary to scroll around to see the whole screen), and the mouse may be quite hard to control.

Cut and Paste

If cut and paste does not work, you may need to install gtkmm and re-boot. vmware-user-suid-wrapper depends on gtkmm, but it's not a dependency of the package. See: https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/43159

General

If you take a snapshot, you can experiment with new or risky operations and easily roll back the change if it doesn't work - a great way to learn and play! Remember to delete your unneeded snapshots as they can be demanding on disk usage.