VirtualBox: extend partition - virtual-machine

I have virtualbox-4.1.0 with centos-5.6 installed in. Now I would like to extend the VM image, which I previously allocated for virtual machine installation, it was 8Gb, that's not enough now. Is there a way to extend the partition without loosing information?
Actually in centos I have one root fs with my home dir etc. so this partition eventually would need to be resized.
Thanks in advance for suggestions!

It can be done in 4 steps :
Clone your VMDK to VDI format with VBoxManage Tool.
Resize the disk to create free space with VBoxManage Tool.
Modify the filesystem to allocate free space for your drive with GParted.
Add created disk space to Linux FileSystem.
The detailed steps are below (tested with "Virtual Machine CentOS 6.4" and "VirtualBox 4.2.18");
Observe disk format of the virtualbox file, if it is not *.vdi, convert disk format from *.wmdk to *.vdi. Open windows terminal:
$ VBoxManage clonehd --format VDI "path_of_wmdk_file" "path_of_vdi_file"
Resize disk size of vdi file. Open windows terminal. For example to do disk size ~500 GB => 512000;
$ VBoxManage modifymedium "path_of_vdi_file" --resize 512000
Choose *.vdi file instead of *.wmdk file as disk
Virtual Machine -> Settings -> Storage -> Controller : SATA (Right Click on *.wmdk file) -> Remove Attachment -> Add HardDisk and choose newly created *.vdi file
Download "gparted-live-x.xx.x-x-ixxx.iso" file from http://gparted.sourceforge.net/download.php. Mount this iso file as CD.
Virtual Machine -> Settings -> Storage -> Controller IDE (Right Click) -> Add CD/DVD -> Select gparted-live-x.xx.x-x-ixxx.iso file
Run virtual machine, Virtual Machine will boot from this CD. Choose default values with pressing "Enter", "Enter" ... until Gpart ISO GUI starts. Select tool gpart program and start.
Extend disk size as below;
Right click on partitions and if "possible" click on "Disable Active Partion".
Extend Partition as much as possible from GUI (for this case 500GB).
Right click the partition which is disabled and select "Enable Active Partion".
Apply and wait until the operations finished.
Shut down virtual machine.
Unmount gparted-live-x.xx.x-x-ixxx.iso.
Virtual Machine -> Settings -> Storage-> Controller IDE (Right Click on gparted-live-x.xx.x-x-ixxx.iso) -> Remove Attachement
Start the virtual machine.
Open linux terminal and login as root. Run commands below;
lvm vgdisplay
=> Free PE / Size 122880 / 480.00 GiB
lvm lvdisplay /dev/VolGroup/lv_root
=> Current LE 3978
Calculate the sum of the values above. In this case : 122880 + 3978 = 126858 <- will be used in the next command
lvm lvresize -l 126858 /dev/VolGroup/lv_root
resize2fs /dev/VolGroup/lv_root
lsblk
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
NAME MAJ:MIN RM SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
sr0 11:0 1 1024M 0 rom
sda 8:0 0 500G 0 disk
+¦sda1 8:1 0 500M 0 part /boot
L¦sda2 8:2 0 499.5G 0 part
+¦VolGroup-lv_root (dm-0) 253:0 0 480G 0 lvm /
L¦VolGroup-lv_swap (dm-1) 253:1 0 4G 0 lvm [SWAP]
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Check whether the filesystem extended or not with creating a huge file:
fallocate -l 480G /test_file
Remove the test file of course:
rm -rif /test_file

I'm using a CentOS7 virtualbox, and I finally enlarged my partition /dev/mapper/centos-root - gparted doesn't work for me because I do not have a desktop on CentOS7 virtualbox.
Power off your CentOS virtual machine
Go into the directory of your *.vdi image. If you don't know where it is, look at your Virtualbox Manager GUI virtualbox -> settings -> storage -> *.vdi -> location e.g. mine is located under ~/VirtualBox VMs/CentOS7/CentOS.vdi
Back up your image just in case anything goes wrong
$ cp CentOS7.vdi CentOS7.backup.vdi
Resize your virtual storage size, e.g. 200 GB
$ VBoxManage modifyhd CentOS7.vdi --resize 204800
Power on your CentOS virtual machine, issue
$ sudo fdisk -l
Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 2048 1026047 512000 83 Linux
/dev/sda2 1026048 209715199 104344576 8e Linux LVM
Use fdisk utility to delete/create partitions
$ sudo fdisk /dev/sda
You are in the fdisk utility interactive mode, issue following commands: (mostly just follow the default recommendation)
d - delete a partition
2 - select a partition to delete (/dev/sda2 here)
n - create a new partition
p - make it a primary partition
2 - make it on the same partition number as we deleted
<return> - set the starting block (by default)
<return> - set end ending block (by default)
w - write the partition and leave the fdisk interactive mode
Reboot your CentOS machine
$ sudo reboot
Resize the physical volume and verify the new size
$ sudo pvresize /dev/sda2
$ sudo pvscan
Take a look at your logical mapping volume to see what volume you want to enlarge, in my case, /dev/mapper/centos-root
Resize the file system by adding -r option, it will take care of resizing for you
$lvextend -r -l +100%FREE /dev/mapper/centos-root
Resize the file system:
$resize2fs /dev/mapper/fedora-root
For CentOS 7: $xfs_growfs /dev/mapper/fedora-root
Last check:
$df -h.
Reference:https://blog.jyore.com/2013/06/virtualbox-increase-size-of-rhelfedoracentosscientificos-guest-file-system/#comment-2879

I found this nugget at the link following. I worked perfect for me and only took 5 seconds.
As of VirtualBox 4 they added support for expansion.
VBoxManage modifyhd filename.vdi --resize 46080
That will resize a virtual disk image to 45GB.
https://superuser.com/questions/172651/increasing-disk-space-on-virtualbox

It can be done with 3 steps :
cloning your VMDK to VDI format using VBoxManage
resize the disk to create free space using VBoxManage
modify the filesystem to allocate free space to your drive, using GParted
Don't forget the last part, otherwise, you will have unallocated free space and your disk will still appear as full.
I wrote a tutorial here to resize your VM Disk

At some point the VBoxManage utility changed the syntax a little bit. It's worth noting that this doesn't work on all vm types so beware if you have a *.vmdk. An example command to change your HD to 40GB is:
$ VBoxManage modifyhd MyVirtualImage --resize 40960
For reference I am on VirtualBox 4.2.1, Mac 10.8.2

From the VirtualBox FAQ:
You have to clone the data from the VDI you already have to a new, larger VDI and expand the partition(s). You can use tools like CloneZilla to clone the virtual hard drive to the bigger one and Gparted to increase the partition size. Another method is to use CloneVDI by mpack and clone the VDI with a larger size, then resize the partition(s) with Gparted.
Since 4.0.0, you can use VBoxManage modifyhd --resize to resize the max size of the VDI. You can only make it bigger. After that, use Gparted to increase the partition size inside the VDI.
Alternatively you could attach another VDI and mount your /home there.

Search for CloneVDI tool on the Oracle VirtualBox forums. It worked for me and is a much easier GUI based program for anyone nervous at the command line. Also allows conversion from fixed to dynamic mode which VBoxManage.exe doesn't support (yet).
https://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=22422

I spent a long time googling and finally got it working for me. ( before I found this ) And I wanted a place to save my work
use vboxmanage to add space to the disk image
use gparted to resize so all space is used
use blivet-gui to create a new volume :
Below is commands I copied from terminal in fedora :
dnf install blivet-gui
blivet-gui
lvremove /dev/mapper/fedora00-00
lvextend -l +100%FREE /dev/mapper/fedora00-root

Related

Which WSL distro is using AppData\Local\Docker\wsl\data\ext4.vhdx after docker-desktop-data was exported and unregistered

Due to increasing space consumption of WSL I was forced to move my WSL distros to another disk.
Ubuntu
docker-desktop
docker-desktop-data
I used these commands.
wsl --shutdown
wsl --export (on all three of those distros)
wsl --import (already on another disk)
Now my environment is running fine but the ext4.vhdx in AppData\Local\Docker\wsl\data is still present and I can't remove it due to it still being used.
When I look at process hadnles
Its still being used by system which is not telling much.
If I run WSL --shutdown all virtual disks present on disk E: lose their handles and the one on disk C: is still being used.
Would you know how to find out what part of WSL or if it even is WSL is using?
Since shutting down WSL does not remove that handle it might be used by something else.
Its not docker-for-desktop that one uses different disk.
Thanks for your suggestions.
Docker Desktop for Windows, which uses WSL2, stores all image and container files in a separate virtual volume (vhdx). This virtual hard disk file can automatically grow when it needs more space (to a certain limit). Unfortunately, if you reclaim some space, i.e. by removing unused images, vhdx doesn't shrink automatically. Luckily, you can reduce its size manually by calling this command in PowerShell (as Administrator):
Optimize-VHD -Path $Env:LOCALAPPDATA\Docker\wsl\data\ext4.vhdx -Mode Full
If the above command fails with
The system failed to compact 'C:\Users\Maxx\AppData\Local\Docker\wsl\data\ext4.vhdx':
The process cannot access the file because it is being used by another process. (0x80070020).
exit form Docker Desktop or stop services and tasks using that file:
net stop com.docker.service
taskkill /IM "docker.exe" /F
taskkill /IM "Docker Desktop.exe" /F
wsl --shutdown
I reclaimed 15Gb of 40Gb.
Origin of the solution.
You can just clean data from interface. Troubleshooting -> Clean/Purge data
Upgrading from WSL1 to WSL2 made it a bit messy, but resetting docker-desktop to its default setting and then purging data from WSL (using docker-desktop troublesshot) cleared it for me.

Why is fdisk -l showing different results for the same vdi virtual drive when different virtual machines are used in VirtualBox

VirtualBox (Version 5.2.24 r128163 (Qt5.6.2)) user with xubuntu guest (Ubuntu 18.04.2 LTS) and Windows 10 host here.
I recently tried to resize my vdi from ~100GB to 200GB. In windows I used the command:
./VBoxManage modifyhd "D:\xub2\xub2.vdi" --resize 200000
That went fine. Then I used a gparted live cd to create a vm, attached the vdi and resize the partitions:
gparted gui
All looks good. If I then use the 'fdisk -l' command whilst in the gparted vm the increased partition sizes are visible as expected.
fdisk -l results for vdi attached to gparted vm
If I try and resize the file system for one of the newly resized logical drives with 'resize2fs /dev/sda5' I am told it is already 46265856 blocks long and there is nothing to do.
However....
If I then re-attach this vdi to an ubuntu vm and boot up with the vdi, the 'fdisk -l' command gives different results and is basically telling me that the drive is still 100GB in size.
fdisk -l results for the same vdi attached to ubuntu vm
The 'df' command confirms that it is not resized.
df command output with same vdi attached to ubuntu vm
If I try the command 'resize2fs /dev/sda5' I get the result:
The filesystem is already 22003712 (4k) blocks long. Nothing to do!
How can I fix this and make the ubuntu vm see that the disk and partitions have been increase in size?
Ok. I will answer my own question (thank you for the negative vote anonymous internet).
This issue occurs when you have existing snapshots of the drive that you are trying to expand associated with a VirtualBox VM.
I found this described in VirtualBox's documentation.
https://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.php?f=35&t=50661
One suggested solution is to delete the snapshots, however I got an error message when I attempted that.
The solution that worked for me was to clone my VM. The cloned VM (which did not have any snapshots associated with it), behaved as expected and showed the correct size for the resized disk.
To be clear: the situation I described above is 100% true.
Hope that helps someone.

Req. Ovftool command to overwrite memory size and CPU count described in ova file during deployment of VM

I have a OVA file(MyOvafile.ova) which contain MemorySize=16GB and CPU count=4.
I have deployed the Ovftool on VMware ESXi server.
I am using the following command to deploy the VM:
/vmfs/volumes/DataStore1/vmware-ovftool/ovftool --memorySize:15360 --name=Test_VM -dm=thin -ds=DataStore1 /vmfs/volumes/DataStore1/OVA_V5.1_BSI-8/MyOvafile.ova
Now the problem i am facing:
As i am giving MemorySize of 15360MB but after deployment VM has the same values as defined in ova file (MyOvafile.ova i.e 16GB)
My Question:
How can i change the value of MemorySize and CPU count through ovftool command?
Apparently, this seems a bug in OVFTOOL (and documentation as well).
CPU and memory cannot be overridden by OVFTOOL's corresponding parameters.
However, there is hack by modifying it in VMX file of VM (and then using reconfigure command).
1) Get VMXfile Location (ending with .vmx) :
vim-cmd vmsvc/getallvms
Vmid Name File Guest OS Version Annotation
72 Test_vm [datastore2] VM_name/VM_name.vmx rhel6_64Guest vmx-08
2) Modify vmx file (for example, using awk) for changing 'vCPUS=REQ_CPUs' entry.
3) Reconfigure .vmx file
vim-cmd vmsvc/reload <VM_ID>
Issue reported in VMware community: https://communities.vmware.com/message/2698710#2698710

Vmware Workstation - Cannot open disks xxxx or one of the snapshot disks it depends on

I'm running Centos7 using Vmware workstation on windows 7 laptop. All was well until I restarted my laptop this morning & my VM started complaining as below
The parent virtual disk has been modified since the child was created. The content ID of the parent virtual disk does not match the corresponding parent content ID in the child
Cannot open the disk 'C:\Users\<user>\Documents\Virtual Machines\CentOS 64-bit\CentOS 64-bit-000003.vmdk' or one of the snapshot disks it depends on.
Module 'Disk' power on failed.
Failed to start the virtual machine.
Below is the image of the folder containing the VM & the image of the VM itself.
I've looked through the vmware log & found the disk ID
2016-03-21T15:56:15.685+13:00| vmx| I125: DISKLIB-LINK : Opened 'C:\virtmac\CentOS 64-bit.vmdk' (0xe): monolithicSparse, 419430400 sectors / 200 GB.
2016-03-21T15:56:15.685+13:00| vmx| I125: DISKLIB-LINK : DiskLinkIsAttachPossible: Content ID mismatch (parentCID b0f614a0 != a0549cb5)
All you have to do is to delete the .lck file from the folder of your vmdk files.
It is generally present at
C:\Users\UserName\Documents\Virtual Machines\VMWareName
Also you can just move the lck files one folder up to ensure you do not delete any other file by mistake.
Deleting all .lck files in the folder should technically solve the problem.
If you use VMs such as Kali Linux, it might happen that the AV quarantines parts of the .vmdk files. In my case I had to restore it from the Windows Defender quarantined files see the screenshot attached
If you are using Kali in VM,
Go to the main directory (Configuration File).
Determine the missing file partition. Ex: kali-linux-2022.3-vmware-amd64-s003.vmdk
Copy any other partition and give it a name of a messing partition.
> copy kali-linux-2022.3-vmware-amd64-s004.vmdk kali-linux-2022.3-vmware-amd64-s003.vmdk
In case you face a Busybox Initramfs Error
type (initramfs) fsck /dev/sda1 -y

Accessing USB drive form WinPE prompt

I am trying to install Windows 8 on virtual box using a bootable WinPE DVD. The image file (.wim) is on the USB stick.
But when I boot from DVD, I cannot find the USB drive.
I need to execute the command
d:\imagex.exe /apply e:\imageC_20150528.wim 1 c:\
where D - dvd drive and say E - usb drive
But I cannot locate the USB drive from the command prompt.
When I use winPE I use DiskPart to determine the drive letter of the USB drive.
-Diskpart
-list volume
This should display all available drives
If the USB drive was inserted before you booted the system into PE, then the USB drive should already be mounted and have a drive letter. If it doesn't then it is likely the drive isn't supported (you might want to change your boot-image/disk to include additional drivers/tools to get access to your usb controller and connected device).
If your USB drive was inserted after you booted the system into PE (and your hardware is supported in PE) then I usually can access the disk in the following manner (worked even in XP PE):
go to commandline and start diskpart (following commands are in diskpart):
issue command: rescan enter
This 'Locates new disks that might have been added to the computer.'
Depending on diskpart version (and/or it's automount setting) this can be enough to automatically mount the file system for a new basic volume when it adds the drive to the system and assigns a drive letter to the volume.
When it doesn't, follow the following 2 steps:
command: list disk enter
to see a list of disks and some info (to check the drive was found)
command: list volume enter
lists volumes on all disks (to find volume number of the USB drive)
command: select volume=# enter (where #= volume number)
to select the specified volume and shift the focus to it
command: assign enter
to assign the next free letter to the current focused volume
OR: assign letter=# enter (where #= driveletter of choice)
This method usually works for me on most hardware.
See also: Diskpart commandline options on MS Technet
Really - you should be using a fairly current version of winPE - 5.1 is what I'm using - which is the version that parallels windows 8.1. I'm switching over to winPE 10 (they changed the numbering to be consistent with Windows)
The reason I bring this us is because you're using imagex - and dism.exe has largely replaced imagex.exe in more current versions of winPE.
If you're just doing this at the command prompt in a generic winPE, you can use mountvol.exe (with no parameters) to discover the drive letters that are available. Everything shifts around drive-letter-wise when you're in winPE. So it might not be e: any more.
Also, dism and/or imagex would be on the x: drive - which is the virtual drive that the winPE creates when it boots.