Why VMWARE is asking me to select the OS when there is an OS in the Iso?

I am using Vmware and I downloaded a Kali Linux Iso. This means that a linux OS is inside the ISO, right? If that's the case why do I need to choose a OS when creating a Virtual Machine in Vmware?

I want to understand what is happening. Does Vmware provide the OS and the ISO only the file system? How does that work?

Vmware asking me to choose an OS

Solution 1:

VMware wants to know both:

(1) What OS type are you installing (Windows, Linux - what flavor of Linux). It needs this for the install, driver and hardware selection and for the VMware Tools it will need.

It will do this as modern VMware guest installations also install Tools as part of the total. This is a distinct advantage and was not always so with VMware and VBOX still needs extensions installed after. Tools will be in OS groups that accommodate numerous specific guests.

Automation of this task may come at some point, but currently there are thousands (and more thousands) of combinations of host hardware and guest operating systems.

Right now it is just easier to group things and asking the OS category is one of those groupings.

(2) Once it knows (1) it needs to know the location of the specific ISO file.

Seems to me here - Situation Normal.

Posted from my Kali VM within VMware Workstation Pro V16.