VB creates wrong .vmdk on Mac OSX

[Alexey Kuznetsov]

Here on mac we all have one restrictions: you can't access /dev/disk0 even from root account. And when you need to access local hard drive under from VB you need to take a dance with scripts.

I'll be short.

vmdk file created with following command are look like this:

# VBoxManage internalcommands createrawvmdk -filename ~/Library/VirtualBox/HardDisks/localhost-fedora.vmdk -rawdisk /dev/disk0 -partitions 0,1,3,4

# Disk DescriptorFile
version=1
CID=08ee3126
parentCID=ffffffff
createType="partitionedDevice"

# Extent description
RW 1 FLAT "localhost-fedora-pt.vmdk" 0
RW 409639 FLAT "/dev/disk0s1" 0
RW 105505120 ZERO 
RW 262144 ZERO 
RW 616930936 FLAT "/dev/disk0s3" 0
RW 155900928 ZERO 
RW 97502216 FLAT "/dev/disk0s4" 0
RW 262184 ZERO 

# The disk Data Base 
#DDB

ddb.virtualHWVersion = "4"
ddb.adapterType="ide"
ddb.geometry.cylinders="16383"
ddb.geometry.heads="16"
ddb.geometry.sectors="63"
ddb.uuid.image="a6aeccaa-3aef-4beb-87b5-8b589dccc940"
ddb.uuid.parent="00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000"
ddb.uuid.modification="00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000"
ddb.uuid.parentmodification="00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000"

but to works correctly it should be this:

# Disk DescriptorFile
version=1
CID=08ee3126
parentCID=ffffffff
createType="partitionedDevice"

# Extent description
RW 40 FLAT "localhost-fedora-pt.vmdk" 0
RW 409600 FLAT "/dev/disk0s1" 0
RW 105505120 ZERO
RW 262144 ZERO
RW 616930936 FLAT "/dev/disk0s3" 0
RW 155900928 ZERO
RW 97502216 FLAT "/dev/disk0s4" 0
RW 262151 ZERO 
RW 33 "localhost-fedora-bt.vmdk" 0

# The disk Data Base
#DDB

ddb.virtualHWVersion = "4"
ddb.adapterType="ide"
ddb.geometry.cylinders="16383"
ddb.geometry.heads="16"
ddb.geometry.sectors="63"
ddb.uuid.image="a6aeccaa-3aef-4beb-87b5-8b589dccc940"
ddb.uuid.parent="00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000"
ddb.uuid.modification="00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000"
ddb.uuid.parentmodification="00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000"

just to mention, wrong lines are (ala diff):

[...]
RW 40 FLAT "localhost-fedora-pt.vmdk" 0
RW 409600 FLAT "/dev/disk0s1" 0
[...]
RW 262151 ZERO 
RW 33 "localhost-fedora-bt.vmdk" 0
[...]

some additional info:

sh-3.2# VBoxManage internalcommands listpartitions -rawdisk /dev/disk0
Number  Type   StartCHS       EndCHS      Size (MiB)  Start (Sect)
1       0xee  1023/254/63  1023/254/63           200            1
2       0xaf  1023/254/63  1023/254/63         51516       409640
3       0x83  1023/254/63  1023/254/63        301235    106176904
4       0x07  1023/254/63  1023/254/63         47608    879008768

sh-3.2# gpt -r show /dev/disk0
gpt show: /dev/disk0: Suspicious MBR at sector 0
      start       size  index  contents
          0          1         MBR
          1          1         Pri GPT header
          2         32         Pri GPT table
         34          6         
         40     409600      1  GPT part - C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B
     409640  105505120      2  GPT part - 48465300-0000-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC
  105914760     262144         
  106176904  616930936      3  GPT part - C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B
  723107840  155899904      5  GPT part - EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7
  879007744       1024         
  879008768   97502216      4  GPT part - EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7
  976510984     262151         
  976773135         32         Sec GPT table
  976773167          1         Sec GPT header
sh-3.2#

and finely, how to create the right -pt, and -bt files:

dd if=/dev/disk0 of=localhost-fedora-pt.vmdk count=40 bs=512
dd if=/dev/disk0 of=localhost-fedora-bt.vmdk skip=976773135 count=33 bs=512

[Alexey Kuznetsov]

miss type, the line:

RW 33 "localhost-fedora-bt.vmdk" 0

should look like:

RW 33 FLAT "localhost-fedora-bt.vmdk" 0