VirtualBox and Folder Sharing
Dan77008 Posted messages 28 Status Membre -
Hello,
On a Windows 11 (host) I installed VirtualBox (7.0.x), mainly out of curiosity.
With guests like Linux Mint MATE, Ubuntu, XP32... Everything seems to work, even the shared folder between the host and the guests.
However, I have a problem with the MAC Catalina guest (I know we shouldn't).
The guest works (except for some mouse freezes), but I can't get the shared directory to work.
The guest additions are properly installed (version visible in machine/information).
Is this normal?
To replace it, I tried to set up a share between Windows and Mac, but it won't work. It's set up as follows:
On Windows:
Network and Sharing Center/Advanced sharing (all enabled except public folder sharing).
In System/Advanced system settings, a workgroup has been set up.
I don't want to enable SMB in Windows (apparently, it's dangerous).
The directory to be shared has been declared as "Shared" (accessible to everyone for read and write).
On MAC:
The network is set to NAT (should it be set to "bridged"?).
Apple/Go/Network (SMB) and the system doesn't accept the username or password????
Is there something simpler to do, or is there up-to-date documentation on sharing? You can find all sorts of things online, even conflicting guidelines.
Thank you.
3 réponses
Hello,
I'm not familiar with the situation on Mac, I have a Catalina virtual machine that I remember is not shared and I use VMWare.
However, I have had comparable "issues" with my Linux virtual machine, which is close to Mac OS; I had to not only enable SMB on Windows but also install Samba on the Linux side and tinker with the default shared VMWare folder to make it visible.
https://forums.commentcamarche.net/forum/affich-37931918-vmware-reseau-local-linux-windows
I'm not sure though, since Mac OS is not natively shareable for legal reasons in virtual machines, whether the tinkering that allowed bypassing it also incorporates the functionality of this shared folder.
You probably need to look for this type of manipulation if it exists for Mac.
Otherwise, the classic sharing should work; the risk of SMB will be inherently limited by the firewall by only allowing NetBios ports 139 and 445 within the local network.
Thank you for your interest.
What bothers me is activating SMB on the Windows 11 side; it is disabled by default.
On the internet, there are no restrictions for local networks.
Hello,
If I'm not mistaken, it's version 1 of SMB that is disabled. The current version is v3.
SMB is ubiquitous on Windows, there's not much to do to implement it:
- right-click on a folder
- properties
- sharing
- advanced sharing
- enable (and set permissions)
On Mac, you will have to find an option to access a share (in Finder, it's the "Go" menu then "Connect to Server"). The address to write will look like smb://computer_name/folder_name (the computer name can be replaced with its local IP).
Hello,
With SMB, it may be more or less the same depending on the OS on the virtual machine; I have one, I can't remember if it's Linux or XP, that won't share anything unless SMB1 is enabled in the optional features, and even if they are shared, you can't see the Windows 10 folders by any means, network path, name...
You just need to proceed by "Trial and Error" and check what you can or cannot see before and after.
Hello,
For XP, you indeed need to enable SMBv1. Version 2 was introduced in Vista and is still supported by Windows 11.
However, my point was about an SMBv3 share between Windows 11 and MacOS Catalina, in an attempt to solve the author's problem. I do not encourage enabling an old version of SMB to establish a share with Windows XP, since VirtualBox allows for bypassing SMBv1 sharing in a virtual machine.