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squidge37
Contributor
Contributor

Wireless keyboard shortcut keys in Guest WinXP, not in host OS?

Ok, I've never used Macs before and I just made the big switch to a MacBook Pro, and I've got WinXP Pro running on Fusion 2.0. I have a Microsoft Wireless Comfort Keyboard and it mostly works, but the shortcut hotkeys don't to what I want them to do.

You can assign these shortcut keys to say "to go google.com" or "open Outlook" or whatever. But my problem is, when I hit a shortcut key, it thinks I'm talking to the Mac when actually I'm trying to talk to WinXP in Fusion. For example, when I hit the Calculator button on the keyboard, I want it to pull up the Calculator in WinXP.

I've got the Microsoft keyboard software installed in both the Mac and the Guest WinXP.

Anyone know how to do this? Or is it impossible to use wireless keyboard shortcut keys within Fusion?

Thanks!

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nut4wine
Contributor
Contributor

It's a little complicated. Look at the advanced users guide and you'll see the following explanation:

USB HID

You might have noticed that some USB devices, such as keyboards and mice, do not show up in the Virtual Machine menu or in the status bar. By default, Fusion screens out Human Interface Devices (HID) because if you attach your mouse/keyboard to a VM, you may have no way to get back out (shutting down the guest may work, and if you've configured Fusion to not automatically connect, unplugging/replugging should work, but if you don't have this set and the guest crashes, you're out of luck). A similar problem exists if you use a Bluetooth mouse/keyboard and attach the Bluetooth adapter to the guest - don't do that either!

This masking is a problem for other devices such as tablets or mice with lots of buttons, since they are also HID and therefore don't appear in the list. If you want to use pressure sensitivity or other advanced features, you need to attach the device to the guest. To get HID entries to appear, add the following line to the .vmx:

usb.generic.allowHID = "TRUE"

If you use this setting, I would recommend disabling Virtual Machine > Settings > USB > Automatically Connect USB Devices so that you have some way to get a mis-connected device back (unplug and replug). Remember not to connect your only keyboard/mouse to the guest!

Example instructions for using a tablet with an Ubuntu guest: Instructions: enable wacom pressure sensitive tablet in Ubuntu 7.10, Leopard & VMware Fusion 1.1

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squidge37
Contributor
Contributor

thanks! now I just have to figure out how to add a line to the .vmx

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admin
Immortal
Immortal

See also : Virtual Hardware for why the guest doesn't see the special keys.

Connecting your only keyboard to the guest is not recommended (among other things, it won't be usable on the host). If you have a spare keyboard and really want to do this, see for how to edit a .vmx file.

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admin
Immortal
Immortal

squidge37 wrote:thanks! now I just have to figure out how to add a line to the .vmxWithin your virtual machine package

1. Open up Fusion, and go to the Virtual Machine Library.

2. Ctrl+click your virtual machine, and select "Show In Finder".

This is your virtual machine bundle.

3. Ctrl+click the virtual machine bundle and select "Show Package Contents".

A new Finder window will open with an assortment of files and folders. In this window, there'll be a file ending in ".vmx".

4. Ctrl+click this file, go to "Open With >" and choseText Edit.

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