Stuck at Initializing VMware Fusion(12.2.3), MacPro 2019, Monterey 12.3

[alexeykondrat]

This is a fresh installation, tried to run from the image and from Application folder. Got this in vmware-vmfusion.log:

2022-03-24T01:51:55.787Z In(05) VMware Fusion MainWithAutoreleasePool: Rosetta translated: 0
2022-03-24T01:51:56.031Z In(05) VMware Fusion InstallDirIsValid: Read only.
2022-03-24T01:52:01.243Z In(05) VMware Fusion MainWithAutoreleasePool: Install Helper registered successfully.
2022-03-24T01:52:01.267Z In(05) VMware Fusion AppleXPC: Connecting to privileged service com.vmware.fusion.InstallHelper...
2022-03-24T01:52:01.267Z Wa(03) host-28925 AppleXPC: Failed to connect to service com.vmware.fusion.InstallHelper
2022-03-24T01:52:01.267Z Wa(03) host-28925 AppleXPC: Failed to connect to service com.vmware.fusion.InstallHelper
2022-03-24T01:52:01.267Z Wa(03) host-28925 Failed to communicated with install helper.

The system log has no mention of any InstallHelper service.

[alexeykondrat · Accepted solution]

Turns out disabling SIP before installation helped. I re-enabled it after installation, works fine.

[chinno53]

Where did you find that log? As I am having the same issue and would love to know where the log is to trouble shoot thanks.

[SchaalPatrick]

Log File locations for VMware Fusion
You can find the log files for VMware Fusion in the following locations

VMware Fusion UI log
/var/tmp/vmware-username/

Please grab the most recent file by its creation date
vmnat.log
/var/log/vmnat.log
Apple Installer Log
/var/log/install.log

VM log
/Users/User Name/vmware/VM Name/vmware.log

source: https://communities.vmware.com/t5/VMware-Fusion-Discussions/Log-File-locations-for-VMware-Fusion/td-... 

[chinno53]

Thanks

[Ziemann1]

The Desktop Hypervisor team at VMware is happy to announce the release of the latest update to Fusion 12

[LoneEagle]

Hi, can you say more? Are you talking about the VoIP protocol?

Can you give instructions for disabling? I manually uninstalled Fusion and still get into the endless "Initializing VMware Fusion" popup

[alexeykondrat]

SIP - System integrity Protection:

disabling_and_enabling_system_integrity_protection 

After re-enabling SIP, the USB ports cannot be shared with the host OS.

[Technogeezer]

You should never, never, never have to disable SIP to get Fusion to work. If you do, IMO you have something else wrong with your system.

Have you tried upgrading to the latest Monterey 12.5 release? There are important security fixes in that release, and anecdotal evidence of some things fixed by Apple that they may have broken in prior releases. 

[alexeykondrat]

I agree, but I've spent many hours troubleshooting and it doesn't look like MacOS bug. Fusion tries to access restricted locations and USB sharing is not working unless I disable file protection. I've recently upgraded to Monterey 12.5, but it looks that the issue still there. Unfortunately, I cannot reboot in the next couple of days to try.

[ColoradoMarmot]

There's something wrong with your setup.  Disabling SIP is absolutely not required by Fusion on a properly configured machine.  

[Technogeezer]

I'm curious. What exactly do you mean by

"fresh installation" - is that a fresh installation of macOS Monterey, or of Fusion 12?

"fusion tries to access restricted locations"-  what does this mean?

Did this Mac Pro ever have a version of Fusion 11 or earlier installed on it?

[alexeykondrat]

The HD was fully formatted. It was clean Monterey 12.2 install and clean Fusion installation. No previous Fusion version on the machine.

I reviewed the install log and figured out that Install Helper was supposed to be installed to write protected directory. Disabling SIP allowed it to be installed and launched. After that I've found that I cannot share USB devices unless I disable File protection "csrutil enable --without fs". If SIP is fully enabled, then no USB devices appear in USB & Bluetooth pane. 

Unfortunately, I cannot try any other solution at the moment. I'm rebooting the machine only if it is absolutely necessary.

[Technogeezer]

That's bizarre that Fusion was trying to install the helper into a write-protected directory. Do you happen to know the directory it was trying to write the installer helper into? 

Understand that you may not have time right now. When you do, let us know because this is definitely not normal behavior.

[alexeykondrat]

Are you working VMWare? I will definitely find time to help to improve the product. We can start by figuring out why I cannot share my USB devices with guest OS unless I disable SIP for file system. 

If I fully enable SIP, then the following window will be empty:

I've started disabling SIP features one by one and found out the "csrutil enable --without fs" allows me to see those devices. What can be wrong? I suspect that "vmware-usbarbitrator" service is not running.

 

[ColoradoMarmot]

You definitely shouldn't have to disable SIP for anything with Fusion.

Just a few checks:

1) Using a real administrator account (user type is admin).  Running the installer from the Mac hard drive (not a network share)

2) don't have root enabled (via a set password)

3) a case insensitive APFS file system

4) No firmware password set

5) No security software (including antivirus or device management like JAMF) installed

6) obtained Monterey direct from Apple and Fusion direct from VMWare

[alexeykondrat]

The answer to all question is YES. 

I wiped out the hard drive and installed the OS from the USP stick which was made with "createinstallmedia" command, the Installer was downloaded on another Mac as normal OS upgrade. I didn't transfer any information from another Mac, but I logged in with my iCloud account.

The whole idea was to do everything clean, without any third party software getting in the way. 

Theoretically, I can get a spare USB3 SSD and repeat this procedure installing a fresh OS on it, it will take me a couple of hours, but will it be helpful? I'm willing to help if VMWare will be listening. First thing - they should improve error reporting, my Installer just hung without saying anything and I had to go through logs trying to figure out what was going on. 

Then, after disabling SIP, installing Fusion and re-enabling SIP, my USB devices didn't show up, I've blamed the HW vendors for a couple of weeks, but it turns out it was SIP.

I do driver development for one of the Apple vendors for many years, so I'm familiar with the kernel and OS.

[alexeykondrat]

I've just got another MacPro 2019, enabled SIP, cleared NVRAM, reinstalled Monterey 12.5 from the recovery partition. Downloaded Fusion   12.2.4 installer from VMware.com, the installer hangs here:

The bar keeps running, but nothing happens.

[Technogeezer]

Reinstalling macOS from the recovery partition without nuking the associated Data volume in the volume group is useless unless that the boot volume is corrupted. And given the system boots from the read-only sealed system snapshot of the macOS boot volume, highly unlikely.

I wonder if your problem exists in the writable Data APFS volume. Since you're running Monterey, did you try "erase all content and settings" per https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT212749 ? Or when booted in macOS Recovery, use Disk utility to erase all volumes in the Macintosh HD APFS volume group before re-installing?

[ColoradoMarmot]

Just to make sure - you're not on a case-sensitive file system, and are installing as a real administrator account?  And there's no third-party security/MDM software like Falcon, JAMF, etc on the system?