There is a known bug about remapping Cursor keys, Insert, Home, Page Up, Delete, End, Page Down in the VMware guest.

It can be solved easily by adding this one line:

xkeymap.nokeycodeMap = true

in the file /etc/vmware/config. As the root user (sudo won't work in this case), this command should do it for you:

echo "xkeymap.nokeycodeMap = true" >> /etc/vmware/config

If this still does not work, follow the instructions bellow:

1. Open up /home/{username}/.vmware, where {username} is the user account you, er, "use".  If you’re doing this in Nautilus, you’ll need to Show Hidden Files.
2. Create a new file in there called "config".
3. Edit config in a text editor, and add the line:

   • xkeymap.nokeycodeMap = "TRUE"

4. Save it, and enjoy!

If neither of these solutions do not help you, read the other possible solutions from the original post - VMWare and the fubar keyboard effect.

Further reading:

• Keyboard Mapping on a Linux Host from VMware
• Keyboard mapping VMWare Server 2.0