VirtualBox only works with floppy disk images which have a certain filename extension

[Donuts]

VirtualBox 4.0.4 seems to refuse to work with floppy disk images unless the image filename has a certain extension. For example, on selecting "myfloppy.bin" in the GUI, VirtualBox says:

Failed to open the floppy image /home/user/myfloppy.bin. Could not get the storage format of the medium '/home/user/myfloppy.bin' (VERR_NOT_SUPPORTED).

Result Code: VBOX_E_IPRT_ERROR (0x80BB0005) Component: Medium Interface: IMedium {9edda847-1279-4b0a-9af7-9d66251ccc18} Callee: IVirtualBox {d2de270c-1d4b-4c9e-843f-bbb9b47269ff}

However, if I rename the file to myfloppy.dsk, there is no problem. I suggest that the filename limitation be removed. (If the selected file is exactly 1474560 bytes long, it will be a raw floppy disk image.)

[aeichner]

Supported extensions are .dsk, .img, .vfd, .ima. The extensions are used to differentiate between floppy and iso images. And a floppy can have different sizes (1.44 and 2.88MB for example). Closing as won't fix.

[Donuts]

Why does VirtualBox need to differentiate between floppy and ISO images? The filename extension should be irrelevant -- whatever file the user selects in the "Please choose a virtual floppy disk file" dialog should be treated as a floppy image.

Reopening because this is a more general deficiency I think; there's no reason to restrict allowable filenames. In cases where more than one image type is supported (e.g. for hard disks) VirtualBox could default to treating an image as raw if it's not a recognised extension, or allow the user to manually specify the format. VirtualBox refuses to allow .bin or .raw extensions to be used for hard disk images.

And if VirtualBox is going to keep this restriction on allowable filename extensions, why allow the user to choose a file with a not-allowed extension in the file-chooser dialog?