Managing networks in VMware Fusion has long been a challenge since VMware had provided a GUI-based method to manage virtual networks in the product. Windows users have enjoyed full network management capabilities in VMware Workstation for quite some time and, with the release of VMware Fusion 5 Professional, Mac users now enjoy this capability, too. The figure below gives you a look at the virtual network management capabilities found in Fusion 5.
For custom networks, you’re able to decide whether the network will connect directly to a physical network (bridged mode) or whether it will share the Mac’s IP address (NAT mode). You are also allowed to enable or disable the DHCP server on the new network. In some cases, you may want to disable the DHCP server so that you can run one inside a virtual machine for testing purposes. I had that need recently while I was still running Fusion 4 and it was a challenge to identify a solution to my problem.
To add a new network, click the + sign at the bottom of the window. This will add a new entry in the Custom section of the window and allow you to make your changes.
This is just one of the features that’s been added to Fusion 5, but because it’s been a long time coming, I wanted to call it out separately.