VMDKMounter + Tuxera NTFS - Writing to mounted Virtual Disks

[gbullman]

I recently rebuilt my Mac (wiped out disk, fresh install of Snow Leopard, copied my previous $HOME directory to new install, Fresh install of Fusion).  I then proceeded to install MacFuse (for some reason the Fusion Install didn't prompt or install it) and Tuxera-NTFS so I could write to NTFS volumes.

MacFuse + Tuxera-NTFS are working fine for writing to physical NTFS disks, but when I mount a VMware Virtual Disk with VMDKMounter it is mounted Read Only with the default Mac OS ntfs.fs.

I do get an entry in the Mac's Logs of;

1/20/11 9:50:59 AM     kernel     MacFUSE: starting (version 2.0.3, Dec 19 2008, 09:57:57)

1/20/11 9:51:00 AM     kernel     disk3s1: ioctl('

1/20/11 9:51:01 AM     hdiejectd[1295]     running

1/20/11 9:51:02 AM     [0x0-0x40040].com.vmware.vmdkmounter[1019]     mount: exec /System/Library/Filesystems/ntfs-3g.fs/Contents/Resources/mount_ntfs-3g for /Volumes/utilityPC.vmdk: No such file or directory

1/20/11 9:51:02 AM     [0x0-0x40040].com.vmware.vmdkmounter[1019]      The disk was mounted successfully with fs type 'ntfs'.

1/20/11 9:51:02 AM     kernel     NTFS driver 3.3 [Flags: R/W].

For some reason it appears to be trying to use NTFS-3G which has never been installed on this system.

I suspect one of two things are going on.

1) VMDKMounter is somehow directing the use of NTFS-3G

2) My $HOME directory copied from the previous install of Mac OS on this machine is somehow configured to try to use NTFS-3G.  I had in fact installed NTFS-3G on the old OS install, then removed it and installed Tuxera-NTFS.

Any ideas on what is causing VMDKMounter to try to run ntfs-3g when mounting Virtual Disks?

I've looked in my ~/Library/Preferences and can't find a plist that looks like it would be related to this.

Should it be possible to write to mounted Virtual Disks with Tuxera-NTFS?

Thanks in advance for suggestions.  This is not a big deal, but every once in a while I want to copy a file to a Virtual Machine without starting it up.  I used to be able to do this with NTFS-3G installed.

I am also working a Tech Support case with Tuxera and will post back if that effort is successful.

[gbullman]

Significant update.  First of all hats off to the tech support at Tuxera.  They have already provided me with a workaround and the tools to likely isolate what is going on.

Best I can tell VMDKMounter does have a preference, perhaps a hard coded use of ntfs-3g;

$ pwd
/Library/Application Support/VMware Fusion/VMDKMounter.app/Contents/MacOS
$ ls
vmware-vmdkMounter     vmware-vmdkMounterTool

$ strings vmware-vmdkMounterTool |grep ntfs

ntfs

ntfs-3g

Only someone from VMware can fill in the significance of those strings and the fact that fusefs or txantfs are nowhere to be found in this executable.  I'm guessing that VMDKMounter tries to mount NTFS filesystems with one of those 2 file system drivers.

The workaround is to use Apple's Disk Utility once VMDKMounter has initially mounted the virtual disk

With the virtual disk mounted select the volume in the tree on the left of Disk Utility (in my case the volume is a child of something similar to a .dmg called flat.

Unmount the virtual disk volume (whatever your child of flat is called) using either the toolbar button or the right-click unmount

With the virtual disk volume still selected choose the mount command with the same approach used to unmount it.

Now you'll notice that it is mounted as a tuxera-ntfs volume and you can both read and write to it.

VMware development, can you change VMDKMounter to let MacOS decide what file system to mount virtual disks with?

[OxkAMam]

If they do change the way it works (and I hope theyt do for the next version, 4 ?), pleae also make sure it works for Paragon's NTFS for Mac driver as well as Tuxera's NTFS for Mac.

[gbullman]

Was hoping to hear from someone at VMware about this by now.

Why isn't VMDKMounter using Mac OS X Disk Arbitration instead of hard coding NTFS or NTFS-3G?  At least that is what I think is going on.

I've looked around a bit but have not figured out how to open a bug report support case with VMware on this issue yet, a link on how to do that would be appreciated.

[WoodyZ]

From: VMware Technical Support Guide

Error (Bug) Report

If you feel you have found an Error in a VMware product and you have an active support contract with us, you should report that to VMware Support via the normal Support Request process.

If you do not have an active support agreement and you want to alert us to an Error, please post the issue to the appropriate product community on the VMware Community Forum.

[gbullman]

Thanks!

Since I don't have an active support contract I guess I've already done as much as I can on this.  At least I have a work around.

[WoodyZ]

You could go this route...

From: VMware Technical Support Guide

Feature Requests

f you have a suggestion for how to improve or enhance VMware software, your input is always welcome. Please submit your suggestions through the Feature Request form on the VMware web site. Unless additional information is needed, you will not receive a personal response. Please note that we do not provide technical support via this form.

[chwilso3]

@gbullman thanks, this was a lifesaver.  I'm using Tuxera NTFS also and I had the same issues with VMDKMounter on Lion.  After following your workaround, I was able to recover a virtual disk that had been hosed by the Credant software I have to install for work...

To the folks at VMware, when are we going to see:

1. VMDKMounter included in VMware fusion 4?
2. Support for other NTFS drivers besides ntfs-3g (i.e. Tuxera)

There are lots of us who are currently using workarounds to achieve this functionality.