When I start a virtual machine, I get error "Insufficient permission to access the file"

[pvivanco]

I am running VMWare Fusion 12 Prod.

When I start a virtual machine (Windows 10), I get the error "Insufficient permission to access the file"

the file path and name is  /Volumes/EVO1T/VirtualMachines/PabsPC/Windows 8 x64.vmwarevm/Windows 8 x64.vmx

when I list the file from the terminal the permission is 775 (-rwxrwxr-x+   1 root  admin          8570 Apr 29 21:26 Windows 8 x64.vmx) and so is its parent folder.

What should the permission be?

Thanks,

Pablo Vivanco

[wila]

Hi,

Your .vmx (and probably all other files) are owned by user root, group admin.

If your user is not part of the admin group then it has no write access according to the output you listed.

Instead of making the whole VM world writable (which is a bad idea), it is better to change the ownership of the folder and files to your own user.

FWIW, I think the normal chmod mask is 644 instead of 775 and that's what I expect to see for the files in the folder and that is already very generous in regards to the world readable part.

--
Wil

[pvivanco]

Hi Will,

Thank you for the feedback.  I changed the file permissions as you suggested, but I still get the same error.

here are the directory and all its files permissions.

ls -lad Windows\ 8\ x64.vmwarevm/

drwxrwxr-x@ 25 root  admin  850 May 11 07:27 Windows 8 x64.vmwarevm/

ls -la Windows\ 8\ x64.vmwarevm/

total 217695864

drwxrwxr-x@  25 root   admin           850 May 11 07:27 .

drwxrwxr-x@  31 root   admin          1054 Apr 29 21:26 ..

drwxrwxr-x+ 215 root   admin          7310 Apr 16 23:32 Applications

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin  105005318144 Apr 29 21:26 Virtual Disk.vmdk

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin    6442450944 Apr 29 21:26 Windows 8 x64-299b5ffa.vmem

drwxrwxr-x+   3 root   admin           102 Jun  7  2020 Windows 8 x64-299b5ffa.vmem.lck

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin       1486295 Apr 29 21:26 Windows 8 x64-299b5ffa.vmss

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin          8684 Apr 29 21:26 Windows 8 x64.nvram

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin          1010 Apr 11 12:08 Windows 8 x64.plist

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin             0 Jun  9  2016 Windows 8 x64.vmsd

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin          8570 Apr 29 21:26 Windows 8 x64.vmx

drwxrwxrwx    3 Pablo  admin           102 May 11 07:27 Windows 8 x64.vmx.lck

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin          3911 Apr  5 17:55 Windows 8 x64.vmxf

drwxrwxr-x+   7 root   admin           238 Jun  9  2016 appListCache

drwxrwxr-x+   3 root   admin           102 May 11 07:27 caches

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin         88385 Apr 28 21:47 mksSandbox-0.log

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin         89509 Apr 26 08:35 mksSandbox-1.log

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin         88480 Apr 25 21:38 mksSandbox-2.log

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin         88480 Apr 29 21:26 mksSandbox.log

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin             0 Nov 21  2018 quicklook-cache.png

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin       1735980 Apr 29 21:26 startMenu.plist

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin       7784311 Apr 28 21:47 vmware-0.log

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin        355082 Apr 26 08:35 vmware-1.log

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin        344851 Apr 25 21:38 vmware-2.log

-rw-rw-r--+   1 root   admin        401949 Apr 29 21:26 vmware.log

Thanks,

Pablo

[wila · Accepted solution]

Hi,

I think you missed the part about the ownership?

Your files are all owned by root:admin, instead they should be owned by Pablo:admin

--
Wil

[pvivanco]

Hi Will,

Yes,  I did miss (or misread) the bit about ownership. 

I did a chmod -R Pablo;admin . ti change the ownership from PabsPC down and this fixed the issue.

Thank you so much for your help.

Pablo Vivanco

[wila]

Pablo,

I might not have been as clear as I thought I was.

Oh and just for others reading this that would be chown instead of chmod (FWIW it's a mistake I also tend to make, I'm sure you did that correct and mistyped it here)

Glad to hear it works now.

--
Wil