While working with VMware Tools, I needed to audit exactly which features/components were installed on a VM. VMware Tools isn’t just one package — it installs several sub-features like drivers, services, and utilities. I wanted a clean report showing each component and whether it was actually installed locally.
WMI/CIM has a class called Win32_SoftwareFeature that tracks individual features of MSI-based products. VMware Tools registers its sub-features there, so you can query it directly:
Get-WmiObject win32_softwarefeature | Where-Object {$_.ProductName -eq 'Vmware Tools'} | Select-Object name, installstate
Here is the list of number in the installstate and their meaning. Number 3 installstate represents Local means installed. More information can be found on https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/windows/desktop/legacy/aa394458(v=vs.85)
| Value | Meaning |
|---|---|
| -6 |
Bad Configuration |
| -2 |
Invalid Argument |
| -1 |
Unknown Package |
| 1 |
Advertised |
| 2 |
Absent |
| 3 |
Local |
| 4 |
Source |
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