[PLUG] More about VirtualBox

Tomas Kuchta tomas.kuchta.lists at gmail.com
Mon Jan 27 01:06:31 UTC 2020


Spelling check correction below:
~/.config/VirtualBox

On Sun, Jan 26, 2020, 20:03 Tomas Kuchta <tomas.kuchta.lists at gmail.com>
wrote:

> I think that it was you mentioning that virtual disks are in ~/.Virtual
> box directory.
>
> Regardless, this is no longer the case for many years. I have a feeling
> that it has changed around v5.
>
> These days vBox stores all VM related files under:
> ~/VirtualBox\ VMs directory
> Configuration files are in:
> ~/.config/VirtualBox directory
>
> Being annoyed is about the only thing one can do about it beside creating
> a soft link and pretending that nothing has changed.
>
> AFAIK, for a while, vBox respected the old ~/.Virtual box directory when
> it encountered it. Not sure how it behaves these days.
>
> Hope that helps to understand things,
> Tomas
>
> PS: I do not really mind that they changed the dir name, but why having a
> space in the dir name is beyond me. Probably some sort of masochism/sadism
> or little egoistic nut in the Linux/Solaris gearbox....
>
>
>
>
> On Sun, Jan 26, 2020, 16:20 John Jason Jordan <johnxj at gmx.com> wrote:
>
>> During the recent discussion here about slow video started by Dick, it
>> was mentioned that VirtualBox keeps the .vdi files in the
>> ~/.VirtualBox/VDI folder, therefore to save your machines all you have
>> to do is back up that folder before engaging in upgrades, then replace
>> it afterwards.
>>
>> Well, after that discussion I suddenly discovered the folder
>> ~/VirtualBox VMs, and inside was a .vdi file for a virtual machine that
>> I created a couple years ago. At that time I had virtual machines for
>> Windows 2000 and Windows XP, and their .vdi files were still in
>> ~/.VirtualBox/VDI.
>>
>> This annoyed me, so I started poking around. I began by moving the
>> new .vdi file to ~/.VirtualBox/VDI, then editing its settings in
>> VirtualBox to reflect the change, and then I renamed the VirtualBox
>> VMs folder. This worked, except as soon as I shut down the new machine
>> I discovered that the VirtualBox VMs folder had been recreated and the
>> new machine's .vdi file had been copied into it.
>>
>> Now I was getting angry. I tried various other things, but I couldn't
>> stop VB from recreating that folder. Eventually I learned that
>> somewhere along the line Oracle changed the rules. Now, when you create
>> a new machine, the default location for it is in ~/VirtualBox VMs. You
>> can change the location, but apparently I had not noticed the default
>> setting when I installed the new machine, so that's where VB created
>> the .vdi file. And once VB thinks that's where the .vdi file belongs,
>> it's going to keep recreating the folder and copying the .vdi file to
>> it.
>>
>> Eventually I solved the problem. I still had the .vdi file in
>> ~/.VirtualBox/VDI, so I removed the entry for the new machine from the
>> main window, then 'recreated' the machine, this time choosing 'use an
>> existing .vdi image.' After deleting the ~/VirtualBox VMs folder yet
>> again, I launched the recreated machine, and now VB no longer recreates
>> the unnecessary folder.
>>
>> Why did I go to all this trouble? Because I like to be able to copy my
>> ~/.VirtualBox folder and know that I have everything. More importantly,
>> I recently stated here that one could do that and know that all the
>> virtual machines were backed up. I must now say that I was possibly
>> wrong. Depending on how long ago you created your virtual machines some
>> of them may be in ~/VirtualBox VMs.
>>
>> And a pox on Oracle for making things more complicated with no benefit
>> at all.
>> _______________________________________________
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>> http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
>>
>



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