VMware non-default synced_folders are provided with incorrect target

Vagrant
1

Versions

  • Host: MacOS 11.4
  • Guest: Windows Server 2016
  • vagrant: 2.2.17
  • vagrant-vmware-utility: 1.0.20
  • vagrant-vmware-desktop: 3.0.0
  • VMware tools: VMware-tools-11.3.0-18090558-x86_64.exe
  • VMware Fusion: 12.1.2

I’ve built a custom Windows Server 2016 box using packer with two builders - vmware-iso and virtualbox. Synced folders work fine on the Virtualbox box.

On the VMware box, the default synced folder works as expected - mounting at c:\vagrant. Any other synced folders, however do not work properly. A symlink gets created at the defined location, but the symlink’s target doesn’t exist. It appears that the vmware-desktop plugin expects the target to be somewhere else.

For example, given this Vagrantfile:

# -*- mode: ruby -*-
# vi: set ft=ruby :

Vagrant.configure("2") do |config|
  config.vm.box = "winserver2016"
  config.vm.synced_folder "../../", 'c:\\Users\\vagrant\\dev'
end

A symlink gets created on the guest at c:\Users\vagrant\dev, but it points to \\vmware-host\Shared Folders\c:\Users\vagrant\dev - a location that does not exist.

If I open \\vmware-host\Shared Folders, the dev location is instead listed as c^%@%Users@%vagrant%@dev. Is this a bug, or am I doing something wrong?

For now, I’ve worked around this by adding a script that replaces the symlink. This works, but isn’t ideal.

# -*- mode: ruby -*-
# vi: set ft=ruby :

# Workaround for vmware provider shared folder
$vmware_mount = <<-'VMWARE_MOUNT'
(Get-Item C:\Users\vagrant\dev).Delete()
New-Item -ItemType SymbolicLink -Path C:\Users\vagrant\dev -Target "\\vmware-host\Shared Folders\c^%@%Users@%Vagrant@%dev"
VMWARE_MOUNT

Vagrant.configure("2") do |config|
  config.vm.box = "winserver2016"
  config.vm.synced_folder "../../", 'c:\\Users\\vagrant\\dev'
  config.vm.provider :vmware_desktop do |v, override|
    override.vm.provision "shell", inline: $vmware_mount
  end
end
2

This is odd, it appears the generated name isn’t properly converting the path. One thing you can try is not including the drive: /Users/vagrant/dev and see if that works.

I’ve opened an issue around what you’re experiencing and we’ll track our reproduction and findings/fixes in there: Synced folder targets · Issue #9 · hashicorp/vagrant-vmware-desktop · GitHub

Cheers!

3

It looks like your suggestion to not include the drive letter does indeed work. :tada: I didn’t realize you could give a *nix style path to a Windows guest. Thanks for the suggestion and opening the issue.