On Nov 14, 2016 9:31 AM user benace posted this detailed discussion: Stretch Guest Broken in Workstation 12 on Ubuntu
VMware Workstation Pro notified me to update VMware Tools last week, and against my better judgment,
I clicked the option, "Yes by all means please update, because I want to spend the next week trying to get my machine working again."
Summary: Definitions: (1) Stretch guest fills the monitor without changing the 800 x 600 resolution, and (2) auto-fit guest fills the monitor and changes the resolution. It is the second option I am attempting to get running. I was running VMware Workstation Pro 10.1.5 on my Windows 10 machine. I had Ubuntu 14.04 server guest. I use awesome X windows manager. The "auto-fit guest" worked and Awesome stretched to fit the resolution of the monitor. Cut-and-Paste was bidirectional. I updated to VMware Workstation Pro 12.5.7 and auto-fit does not work anymore.
Tried uninstalling VMware Tools along with open-vm-tools
Reinstalled as before (see A below)
Auto-fit still does not work
Attempted separate installations of VMware Tools or open-vm-tools
Auto-fit did not work in either of those cases
Built a new virtual machine with Ubuntu 16.04 (see B below) because open-vm-tools packaged with distribution
Auto-fit did not work
Updates:
- On the 16.04 virtual machine uninstalled open-vm-tools and installed VMwareTools-10.1.6. Did a sudo reboot and ran awesome. Screen did not auto-fit. Next I tried installing open-vm-tools without removing VMwareTools, rebooted, and screen still did not resize.
- A workaround is to use stretch guest. The resolution is set in Virtual Machine Settings > Display, then select "specify monitor settings" and provide the resolution for the screen. After booting the machine Ctl-Alt-Enter into full screen. The 800 x 600 resolution is expanded to fill the screen. This isn't a crisp display, but is workable. The internal copy-paste function from the VM Edit drop down does not work, however copy-paste between host and guest works.
If anyone can offer some suggestion(s) on how to get auto-fit guest running with Windows 10 host and Ubuntu 16.04.3 guest I would appreciate it. Heck, even just get it running on Ubuntu 14.04.
A. Auto-fit guest was working in the following configuration:
Windows 10 host (1920 x 1080 resolution) and VMware Workstation Pro 10.1.5 installed
Created a new Ubuntu 14.04 virtual machine server (note: not desktop)
Installed VMware Tools from tar as per VMware documentation
sudo apt-get install open-vm-tools
I am using awesome X windows manager (tiling):
sudo apt-get install xinit
sudo apt-get install awesome
sudo apt-get install awesome-extra
Auto-fit guest does work
B. Auto-fit guest is not working with following update:
Windows 10 host (1920 x 1080 resolution) and VMware Workstation Pro 12.5.7 installed
Created a new Ubuntu 16.04 server (note: not desktop)
On easy-install of virtual machine open-vm-tools was installed with no errors
Did not install VMware Tools
I am using awesome X windows manager (tiling)
sudo apt-get install xinit
sudo apt-get install awesome
sudo apt-get install awesome-extra
Auto-fit guest does not work
In both cases the virtual machine settings were:
Display: Auto-detect (Use host setting for monitors)
Graphics Memory: 768 MB
Edit > Preferences > Auto-fit guest: selected
View > Auto-size : Auto-fit Guest is selected
