vmware directory for installing guest OS is Full? ?

[icedT]

Operation on file '/var/lib/vmware/VirtualMachines/VL5.8/VL5.8.vmdk" failed (no space left on device) the file system where disk /var/lib/vmware/VirtualMachines/VL5.8/VL5.8.vmdk" resides is FULL. Choose retry to attempt the operation again.. Choose abort to terminate the session.



the details of my VL setup in VM is

Memory 256mb
Harddisk IDE 0:0 (80.0G)
CDROM IDE 1:0 /dev/cdrom
Mouse : ps/2
floppy : /dev/fd0
ethernet : Bridged
Processors : 1


any suggestions? thanks

[Rob Leadbeater · Accepted solution]

Hi,

It would appear that your /var partition is full. What does the output of

"df -h" show you ?

You might also want to post which VMware product you're using and what version.

Cheers,

Rob

[Ivan Ferreira]

That message indicates that the /var is full. You need more space in /var or reduce the size of your virtual disk.

[icedT]

yes i know.. but isn't that its only a "virtual memory" so im thinking.. why would it be full IF i am just installing a distro on a virtual space disk? as far as i could remember ...

me@darkstar:/var/lib/vmware/VirtualMachines/VL5.8$ ls
VL5.8.vmdk VL5.8.vmsd VL5.8.vmx* nvram vmware.log

the ".vmdk" consumes the space since it has the biggest size.. (just forgot to include the "-l" option...

[Rob Leadbeater]

Hi,

If I remember correctly the vmdk files are the virtual hard disks. So if you created a VM with a 10GB hard disk, you'd get a 10GB vmdk file...

Cheers,

Rob

[icedT]

hmm okay . . so wat should i do? :( should i lessen the VM disk space? -----just to install the guest linux OS?

[TY 007]

Hello ICE,

>> Harddisk IDE 0:0 (80.0G)
>> so wat should i do? :(
>> should i lessen the VM disk space?

IDE Hard Disk? Value Buy - 160GB, 250GB, 320GB if the machine supports.

Thanks

[Rob Leadbeater]

According to your original post, you've got 80GB of disk space, so that should be more than enough for a few Virtual Machines.

What you probably need to do is store your VM files in a different file system.

If you want more information, give the details requested previously...

Cheers,

Rob

[icedT]

the details of my VL setup in VM is

Memory 256mb
Harddisk IDE 0:0 (80.0G)
CDROM IDE 1:0 /dev/cdrom
Mouse : ps/2
floppy : /dev/fd0
ethernet : Bridged
Processors : 1


The Hdisk space of 80G is ONLY the "Virtual Hdisk space" do you mean.. i will try to set the VM disk in a smaller size? lets say 15-20G only? --sorry a bit confused here ---

[Rob Leadbeater]

OK. I think I'm getting myself (and you) confused !

What is the physical setup ?
Which VMware product are you using ?
What version of that product are you using ?

Cheers,

Rob

[icedT]

ok . . the MAIN distro being used is Slackware12.0 -- and it has a TOTAL space of 20G (because my entire HD is 80G and is partitioned for different distros )

the Vmware version was downloaded from



http://www.vmware.com/download/server/



and the version is:

VMware-server-1.0.3-44356.tar.gz

[Rob Leadbeater]

OK. So you're using VMware Server 1.0.3, however I'm still not clear on the physical setup...

When you log on to the physical machine (running Slackware ...?) what do you see when you issue the command "df -h" ?

Cheers,

Rob

[icedT]

ok il update this post ASAP. .. il check it when i come home. . thanks for the replies :)

[Ivan Ferreira]

Your best option is to create a virtual disk with a size "lower" than the free space of the partition that will hold the virtual disk file.

Also, uncheck "allocate all space now".

[icedT]

icey@darkstar:~$ df -h
Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/hdc5 1.9G 489M 1.4G 26% /
/dev/hdc6 93M 22M 66M 25% /boot
/dev/hdc8 954M 36M 919M 4% /tmp
/dev/hdc9 954M 57M 898M 6% /var
/dev/hdc10 4.7G 3.3G 1.5G 70% /usr
/dev/hdc11 9.4G 514M 8.9G 6% /home
/dev/hda1 19G 14G 5.1G 74% /mnt/windows
/dev/hda5 20G 12G 8.0G 60% /mnt/winback


cd /usr/lib/vmware :

ls -l (disregarded the small files)

-r--r--r-- 1 root root 1067841 2007-08-19 12:51 vix-perl.tar.gz

so i think this file causes (the process of installing the guest OS to be full? ) i mean even if im not starting the guest os install yet.. my /var is already at 70%...and the file is already a gig in size...? hmm any ideas IF i can rm this file?

[icedT]

CORRECTION. . . i made a mistake on my last post.. the df output is correct BUT i typed the wrong fs in my message.. the 70%% is /usr and NOT /var. .

just moved the tar.gz file in my /mnt/winback

and i am now testing the guest os install IF it will result in the same OUTPUT... il update this post at once. .. thanks

[Rob Leadbeater]

Hi,

You seem to be confusing things...

The file you've just moved is only 1067841 bytes in size - just over 1MB. That's not the cause of /var filling up...

Looking back at your original problem, we can see that your virtual machines files are being stored under /var However that file system is only 954MB in size, which will quickly get used up when creating VMs.

/var/lib/vmware/VirtualMachines appears to be the default area for storing virtual machine files on VMware Server. As /var is so small, you will probably want to move that data store somewhere else.

Refer to the admin guide (page 123) here:

http://www.vmware.com/pdf/server_admin_manual.pdf

Hope this helps,

Regards,

Rob

[Marcel Burggraeve]

Looks like there's some confusion here.
Even though the disk of your guest OS is virtual the requested diskspace needs to be allocated by the host OS.
When you create a guest environment with a disk of let's say 30GB a 'containerfile' with the size of 30GB will be created.
Inside this 'containerfile' you will have your guest OS.
This 'containerfile' is the .vmdk file you mentioned earlier.
There's no such thing as compression as such so a guest OS of xGB will take xGB of diskspace.

The only solution might be to do like Ivan suggested, uncheck allocate all space now.
However, I have no clue what kind of problems you run into if you do this and the disk goes to 100%

[icedT]

actually i always "UNCHECK" the radio button allocate disk space. . whenever i create the Virtual disk.. i will update this post as soon as i have the time to install again the guest OS.. and try TO install it in another location which is bigger in space compared to /var as what Rob said (through the link he gave)

:)

[Rob Leadbeater]

Hi,

Another thing to bear in mind when deciding where to put your virtual machine files, is the amount of virtual memory (RAM) that you assign.

Assuming the VMware Server works in a similar fashion to ESX Server then you get a file on the system which is the size of the memory you allocated.

So for example if you created a VM with 128MB RAM, and 4GB Disk space, then you'll need at least 4224MB free in the file system hosting your virtual machines.

Cheers,

Rob

P.S. Remember to assign points if people have helped you out...

http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/helptips.do?#28

[icedT]

yes thanks i will not forget the ratings on the answers/replies.. il do it when i have come up with the guest OS installation.. BTW in the memory/RAM section i always choose / accept the recommended/ default settings of the certain section. .

[icedT]

root@darkstar:/home/vmware/VirtualMachines# ls -l
total 1305
-rw------- 1 icey users 1376256 2007-09-12 19:03 VL5.8
-rw------- 1 icey users 0 2007-09-12 19:03 VL5.8.vmsd
-rwxr-xr-x 1 icey users 577 2007-09-12 19:03 VL5.8.vmx*
root@darkstar:/home/vmware/VirtualMachines# df -h
Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/hdc5 1.9G 489M 1.4G 26% /
/dev/hdc6 93M 22M 66M 25% /boot
/dev/hdc8 954M 36M 919M 4% /tmp
/dev/hdc9 954M 59M 896M 7% /var
/dev/hdc10 4.7G 3.3G 1.5G 70% /usr
/dev/hdc11 9.4G 535M 8.8G 6% /home
/dev/hda1 19G 14G 5.1G 74% /mnt/windows
/dev/hda5 20G 12G 8.0G 60% /mnt/winback
/dev/hdd 700M 700M 0 100% /mnt/cdrom


/dev/hdc11 9.4G 3.6G 5.8G 39% /home


root@darkstar:/home/vmware/VirtualMachines# ls -l
total 3170278
-rw------- 1 icey users 536870912 2007-09-12 19:04 564d8c01-536b-505b-9228-bafa91babb63.vmem
-r--r--r-- 1 icey users 11 2007-09-12 19:04 564d8c01-536b-505b-9228-bafa91babb63.vmem.WRITELOCK
-rw------- 1 icey users 2736783360 2007-09-12 19:35 VL5.8
-r--r--r-- 1 icey users 11 2007-09-12 19:04 VL5.8.WRITELOCK
-rw------- 1 icey users 0 2007-09-12 19:03 VL5.8.vmsd
-rwxr-xr-x 1 icey users 865 2007-09-12 19:04 VL5.8.vmx*
-rw------- 1 icey users 8664 2007-09-12 19:04 nvram
-rw-r--r-- 1 icey users 27017 2007-09-12 19:34 vmware.log


UPDATE -- set my VM to 10G an installed in /home. . BTW since at first WHILE the guest OS is not installed yet my /home is only 6% and now when the guest OS is installed .. its now 39% DOES it mean that EVERYTIME i install a guest OS my /home will also increase? if that's the case.. I have only limited number of guest OS to be installed. . .

[Rob Leadbeater]

> DOES it mean that EVERYTIME i install a
> guest OS my /home will also increase?

Yes. Each virtual machine will create a set of files, the size of which will be up to the size of the virtual disks you created.

So if you created a virtual machine with a 10GB virtual disk, then you will potentially need at least 10GB of space in /home.

If you haven't got the "allocate all space now" option checked then the files will be created smaller. In your case, you've currently got a 2.6GB file, however that file size could grow up to 10GB if you fill the VM's file system with data - although things will probably fall over in a heap before that, as /home is only 9.4GB in size.

Cheers,

Rob

[icedT]

actually I DID NOT CHOSE the "allocate disk space" so that means. . every time i install a Guest OS, my /home will increase so I will be limited to a fixed number of guest OS.. maybe 2 or 3 more guest OS?

BTW my plan in setting up the VM is just for experimentation and administration. .at least i have this "development" distro.. since my "production" OR live distro is the one that i had installed in my HD (which is slackware)

THANKS TO ALL !! I already submitted the points I had given on your replies! (^^,)

Hats off to everyone! til next time!

[icedT]

latter reply of the contributors :)