Delete Unwanted Windows Apps from Launch Pad with VMWare Fusion
April 13, 2012 17 Comments
VMWare Fusion has an option to “Run Windows Apps from your Mac’s Applications folder”. This option also integrates with Launch Pad. When playing around with turning this on and off, I got into a situation where there were leftover Windows app icons that Fusion refused to delete.
It turns out that part of the Fusion magic is to put entries into the SQLite database that Dock.app uses to decide what to show in Lanch Pad. You can use the sqlite3 editor at the command-line in terminal to edit the database.
Heres’ the list of columns:
item_id|title|bundleid|storeid|category_id|moddate|bookmark
The sqlite3 command-line app lets you execute arbitrary SQL statements against a SQLite database. In my case, I had turned off the app integration feature with Launch Pad but had stray icons. Here’s a terminal SQL command to clear out any stray magic VMware Fusion virtual icons.
cd ~/Library/Application\ Support/Dock
sqlite3 *.db “delete from apps where bundleid like ‘com.vmware.proxyApp.%’;”
sqlite3 *.db ‘delete from apps where bundleid like “com.vmware.proxyApp.%”;’
killall Dock
The killall command will cause Dock.app to restart. And after restart, all VMWare induced Windows icons will be gone from Launch Pad.
Brian Reiter's Thoughtful Code 
What exactly do I type into the terminal? When I put it in exactly as written above I get an error saying “too many options: “from””.
Try reversing the quoting so that single ticks are surrounding the sql statement.=
$ sqlite3 *.db ‘delete from apps where bundleid like “com.vmware.proxyApp.%”;’
Thanks, that worked!
hi there,
Thanks so much for the tip.
I have tried to reverse the quoting, but I’m getting the same error as the previous poster:
sqlite3: Error: too many options: “from”
Any suggestions?
Fantastic post! got it all working – Thnx
Basic problem here is that paste into the Terminal will replace these straight quotes with smart ones. Overtype the single quotes with the single quote key and the double quotes with the double quote key and you will be golden. Open quote and close quote are not valid delimiters in sqlite3 (apparently) and nor are the single quote equivalents.
This worked like a charm . . .
when I copy and paste the command, there were some error. But after I retype quotation and double quotation marks, it works beautifully.
Thanks!!
Thanks a million for this. I’d never have figured this out!
Awesome! I got the same from error as others did above, but after retyping ” and ‘ in the terminal … poof … all win 7 icons are gone from launchpad.
Unfortunately, doing this will also kill all the folders I have configured on the Launchpad, thus turning all the other icons a mess. Do you know any workaround for that?
Thank you in advance!
I followed these instructions and I’m still getting the same error too many options
Last login: Fri Nov 8 17:27:44 on ttys000
daniels-imac:~ danielfrosceno$ cd ~/Library/Application\ Support/Dock
daniels-imac:Dock danielfrosceno$ sqlite3 *.db ‘delete from apps where bundleid like “com.vmware.proxyApp.%”;’
sqlite3: Error: too many options: “delete from apps where bundleid like “com.vmware.proxyApp.%”;”
Use -help for a list of options.
daniels-imac:Dock danielfrosceno$
My guess is that the smart quotes from the WordPress CMS are messing you up. Try typing instead of pasting.
If you do an ls of the Dock directory you’ll see the .db filename, it appears the *.db doesn’t work with 10.9.
cd ~/Library/Application\ Support/Dock
ls
[copy the filename of the .db file]
sqlite3 long-filename-pasted-here.db ‘delete from apps where bundleid like “com.vmware.proxyApp.%”;’
killall Dock
That worked for me with Fusion Pro v6.0.1 / OSX10.9
Cheers
Matt M Thank you soooo much!!! Finally worked. I’ve been messing with this for weeks
Thanks