Introduction
A .vmwarevm is the virtual machine bundle (also called a package) that
VMware Fusion makes on macOS: a folder that the Finder shows as one
item, so that a machine can be copied and moved as a single unit. VMware's article on the contents of a
Fusion bundle says the bundle is made up of many files, and that to work with them you turn the bundle
into a folder by removing .vmwarevm from its name in Get Info (and put the extension back
afterwards). The bundle is not a file format of its own: it has no header and holds ordinary files.
Structure
The members are the files of the machine. The table is VMware's, from the article.
| Member | What it is |
|---|---|
<name>.vmx | The primary configuration file: the settings chosen in the New Virtual Machine Assistant or the machine settings. |
<name>.vmxf | A supplemental configuration file. |
<name>.vmdk, <name>-s<###>.vmdk, <name>-f<###>.vmdk | A virtual disk. A disk split into files of 2 GB shows as slices: s (sparse) if the space is not allocated in advance, f (flat) if it is. |
<name>-<######>.vmdk (and -s or -f slices) | A redo-log (snapshot) disk, made when the machine has snapshots; it stores the changes made to the disk while the machine runs. The number is a unique suffix. |
<name>.vmsd | The centralised snapshot dictionary. |
<name>-Snapshot<##>.vmsn | A snapshot state file: the running state when the snapshot was taken. |
<name>.vmss | The suspended state file. |
<name>.vmem, <name>-Snapshot<##>.vmem | The RAM of the running machine, or at the time of the snapshot. |
<name>.nvram | The state of the machine's BIOS (.nvram). |
vmware.log | A log of machine activity such as start-ups and shut-downs, not of events inside the guest; useful for troubleshooting. It is kept in the folder that holds the .vmx. |
When a folder holding a .vmx, or a folder named .vmwarevm, is opened in the
explorer, it names each member from this table, reads the name, guest and memory from the .vmx, and
lists the files the configuration names with whether each is in the folder. Members the article does not
describe are labelled not described.
Not described
Known, not yet covered
- Viewer: the folder view describes members by name and reads only the .vmx; it does not follow the disk chain or the snapshot tree. The files open one by one in their own viewers.
Unknown
- Reference: other members that Fusion adds (lock folders, caches, plists): the article read does not list them.
Links
Software
- VMware Fusion – VMware's virtual machine software for the Mac (macOS)
Reference
- Contents of the virtual machine bundle in Fusion – VMware's table of the files in a bundle