Enable a shared folder for a virtual machine
You can enable shared folders for a specific virtual machine. Here are the steps:
1. Choose the virtual machine and select Player > Manage > Virtual Machine Settings:
2. Go to the Options tab and select the Shared Folders option:
3. Under Folder sharing, choose a sharing option. Two options are available:
- Always enabled – keeps folder sharing enabled, even when the virtual machine is shut down, suspended, or powered off.
- Enabled until next power off or suspend – enable folder sharing temporarily, until the virtual machine is shut down, suspended, or powered off. Note that if the virtual machine is restarted, shared folders will remain enabled.
4. (Optional) You can also map the drive to the Shared Folders directory that contains all shared folders. To do that, select the Map as a network drive in Windows guests option.
5. Click Add to add a share folder:
6. The Add Shared Folder Wizard opens. Click Next to Continue:
7. Type the path on the host system to the directory you want to share and specify its name:
8. Select shared folder options:
- Enable this share – enables the shared folder. Deselect this option when you want to disable the shared folder without deleting it from the virtual machine configuration.
- Read-only – makes the shared folder read-only. The virtual machine can view and copy files from the shared folder, but it cannot add, change, or remove files.
View a shared folder
A shared folder appears differently, depending on the guest operating system type and version. To view a shared folder in a Windows guest OS, go to Windows Browser > Network. You should see a list of computer available on the network, including a computer named vmware-host:
Double click vmware-host and browse to the shared folder:
You can also go directly to the shared folder by using the UNC path:
In a Linux virtual machine, shared folders appear under the /mnt/hgfs directory:
