If this is the wrong group, my apologies.

I'm running Fedora 8 and have VMware 6.* installed along with the
vmware-any-any* patch applied. I'm using a physical HD with partitions for
drive D: and drive E: in the MS Windows XP virtual machine.

Every time I boot Fedora, it changes the permissions in the /dev directory
for all sd* devices to rw-------. The owner is root and the group is disk
(which I added, originally the group was root). It retains the owner,
group, and user definitions correctly.

I added my userid to group disk and if the /dev/sd* permissions are set to
rw-rw---- (chmod 660 sd* in the /dev directory), I have no problems
accessing any of the installed SCSI HDs from inside a vmware machine. I can
start vmware and it correctly boots the Win XP system with access to the
physical disk partitions /dev/sdb1 and /dev/sdb5. The problem is that
fedora resets the permissions in /dev to rw------- (i.e. chmod 600 sd* in
/dev would yield the same settings) at boot time.

Does anyone know of a way to have the access permissions retained between
fedora reboots?

Or can someone explain to me why they keep getting reset to rw-------?

Or point me to a man page or VMware doc that explains why this is occurring?

TIA, best regards,

rexb
rex.basham@gmail.com

RBasham wrote:
> If this is the wrong group, my apologies.
>
> I'm running Fedora 8 and have VMware 6.* installed along with the
> vmware-any-any* patch applied. I'm using a physical HD with partitions for
> drive D: and drive E: in the MS Windows XP virtual machine.
>
> Every time I boot Fedora, it changes the permissions in the /dev directory
> for all sd* devices to rw-------. The owner is root and the group is disk
> (which I added, originally the group was root). It retains the owner,
> group, and user definitions correctly.
>
> I added my userid to group disk and if the /dev/sd* permissions are set to
> rw-rw---- (chmod 660 sd* in the /dev directory), I have no problems
> accessing any of the installed SCSI HDs from inside a vmware machine. I can
> start vmware and it correctly boots the Win XP system with access to the
> physical disk partitions /dev/sdb1 and /dev/sdb5. The problem is that
> fedora resets the permissions in /dev to rw------- (i.e. chmod 600 sd* in
> /dev would yield the same settings) at boot time.

Why can't VMWare use them this way? Isn't it running as a root user?

> Does anyone know of a way to have the access permissions retained between
> fedora reboots?
>
> Or can someone explain to me why they keep getting reset to rw-------?

Where this gets set has evolved over time. You could either set up a little init script to set your devices the way you want, or you can look in the udev configuration files for help with it.

>
> Or point me to a man page or VMware doc that explains why this is occurring?

Can you buy a support contract and call VMWare?

> TIA, best regards,
>
> rexb
> rex.basham@gmail.com
>
>

RBasham wrote:
> If this is the wrong group, my apologies.
>
> I'm running Fedora 8 and have VMware 6.* installed along with the
> vmware-any-any* patch applied. I'm using a physical HD with partitions for
> drive D: and drive E: in the MS Windows XP virtual machine.
>
> Every time I boot Fedora, it changes the permissions in the /dev directory
> for all sd* devices to rw-------. The owner is root and the group is disk
> (which I added, originally the group was root). It retains the owner,
> group, and user definitions correctly.
>
> I added my userid to group disk and if the /dev/sd* permissions are set to
> rw-rw---- (chmod 660 sd* in the /dev directory), I have no problems
> accessing any of the installed SCSI HDs from inside a vmware machine. I can
> start vmware and it correctly boots the Win XP system with access to the
> physical disk partitions /dev/sdb1 and /dev/sdb5. The problem is that
> fedora resets the permissions in /dev to rw------- (i.e. chmod 600 sd* in
> /dev would yield the same settings) at boot time.
>
> Does anyone know of a way to have the access permissions retained between
> fedora reboots?

Change the permission rules in /etc/udev/rules.d to add the GROUP permission.

>
> Or can someone explain to me why they keep getting reset to rw-------?

Because under udev (udevd) all devices are created dynamically.

>
> Or point me to a man page or VMware doc that explains why this is occurring?

Doubt vmware will say anthing about it ... search for info about udev.

Future article I'm working on will be at: http://www.ntlug.org/Articles/Hotplug

"Nico Kadel-Garcia" <nkadel@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:47A5EFEF.7080504@gmail.com...
:
: Why can't VMWare use them this way? Isn't it running as a root user?

VMWare only runs as root if you start it as root. Otherwise it runs with
the same authority as the user who started it.
:

:
: Where this gets set has evolved over time. You could either set up a
little init script to set your devices the way you want, or you can look in
the udev configuration files for help with it.

I was trying to avoid the init script. I'm sure it's the udev settings but
not sure how to code the rules to prevent/correct the problem. Guess it's
time for some serious man and info reading.
:
:
: Can you buy a support contract and call VMWare?

I have a valid support contract with VMWare. I bought the upgrade to
version 6 last June and I believe the support is valid for one calendar
year.

Thanks for the replies.

best regards,

rexb
:
: > rex.basham@gmail.com
: >
: >
:

"Chris Cox" <notccox@notairmail.net> wrote in message
news:13qcbdh83i8sice@corp.supernews.com...
:
: Change the permission rules in /etc/udev/rules.d to add the GROUP
permission.
:
: >
: > Or can someone explain to me why they keep getting reset to rw-------?
:
: Because under udev (udevd) all devices are created dynamically.
:
: >
: > Or point me to a man page or VMware doc that explains why this is
occurring?
:
: Doubt vmware will say anthing about it ... search for info about udev.
:
: Future article I'm working on will be at:
http://www.ntlug.org/Articles/Hotplug
:

Thanks for the response, guess it's time to hit the doc on udev.

best regards,

rexb