Enable content Copy/Paste between VMRC client and Windows/Linux Virtual Machine

Products

• VMware vCenter Server 7.0
• VMware vCenter Server 8.0

Issue/Introduction

This article provides the basic steps to enable the Copy/Paste between the VMRC client and a Windows/Linux Virtual Machine.

Note:

• The Copy/Paste between VMRC client and MacOS virtual machine is not currently supported.
• This steps provided in this KB will help with copying data only, not the file/folder.
• This is per VM level configuration.
• For ESXi virtual machines, one-way copy/paste feature from the client machine to/from VMRC (VM) is currently not supported.This may be feasible for local virtual machines on workstations, but not for ESXi virtual machines.

Resolution

1. To resolve this issue, first install or upgrade the VMware tools for the Windows/Linux virtual machine. For more information see Installing and upgrading VMware Tools in vSphere.
   
   From the vCenter Server HTML5 Web Client

   1. Power off the VM.
   2.  Enable the Copy & Paste for the Windows/Linux virtual machine:
      1. Right-click the virtual machine and click Edit Settings.
      2. For vCenter 7.0
         1. Click the VM Options tab, expand Advanced, and click Edit Configuration.
            
         2. Click on Add Configuration Params three times to give three rows 
         3. Fill in the Name and Value fields as mentioned below:
            
            

            Name	Value
            isolation.tools.copy.disable	FALSE
            isolation.tools.paste.disable	FALSE
            isolation.tools.setGUIOptions.enable	TRUE

         4. Click OK to save and exit out of the Configuration Parameters wizard. (Note: These options override any settings made in the guest operating system’s VMware Tools control panel. )
         5. Click OK to save and exit out of the Edit Settings wizard.
      3. For vCenter 8.0 
         1. Click the "Advanced Parameters" tab.
         2. Click filter icon of Attribute column. Search for 3 items' names, check if they already exist. If yes, edit their corresponding values. If not, add them from the textboxs above.

            Name	Value
            isolation.tools.copy.disable	FALSE
            isolation.tools.paste.disable	FALSE
            isolation.tools.setGUIOptions.enable	TRUE

         3. Click "OK".
   3. Power on the VM
   4. Then use Copy/Paste directly on Windows/Linux/any other platform. 
   5. For paste operation's target platform is Linux, Older X applications do not use a clipboard. Instead, the system allows pasting of the currently selected text (called the "primary selection") without copying it to a clipboard. Pressing the middle mouse button is usually the way to paste the primary selection. For more information see Copying and pasting from a Windows guest to Linux host.