Shared folders in VirtualBox

[minthaka]

I'd like to know how to access a shared folder, let's say the
/home/myname/shared

I'm using Mandriva Linux as host OS, and have installed Gutsy as a guest. I would like to use a shared folder for application's development. Unfortunatelly the Unix commands has different kind of outputs in the two Linuxes so I need to work paralelly in two OS's.

I have installed VirtualBox Guest Additions, but don't know how to reach the folder from within Gutsy.

thanks!

[Jonathan183]

Did you try ...

mount -t vboxsf [-o OPTIONS] sharename mountpoint

given in the VirtualBox help?

Steps should be ...
1. create folder to share (lets say its /home/your-name/share-folder)
2. select virtual machine and setup share folder (folder path is /home/your-name/share-folder ... and you set folder name to my-share)
3. start vm and create folder in vm to mount share to (lets say its /media/shared-stuff then

sudo mkdir /media/shared-stuff

)
4. then mount the shared folder in the vm

sudo mount -t vboxsf my-share /media/shared-stuff

... note its vboxsf not vboxfs in the mount command.
If that does not work what errors do you get ?

[minthaka]

O.K. I've succeeded to mount the folder, but I still cannot write into the shared folder from the guest OS. I can list its content, eventually open it, but not change it. How could I gain write access?

[Jonathan183]

You can make the share read only in vbox setup ... so I'd check that first ... what does the guest OS return for mount? is it listing rw or ro access? what permissions does your shared folder have in the host OS?

[minthaka]

Basically under the guest it is owned by root. It mounts normally, I've tried to mount with defaults option, but it won't give me write access. In VirtualBox full access is enabled. I'll try to use mc for copy as root.

[minthaka]

Yes, it works with mc.