Symlinks within shared folders in VirtualBox: Operation not permitted and Read Only Filesystem
This blog post was published 11 years ago and may or may not have aged well. While reading
please keep in mind that it may no longer be accurate or even relevant.
This is not a bug, it is a security feature of Virtual Box. Nevertheless it is annoying. To enable symlinks:
VBoxManage setextradata <MACHINE_LABEL> VBoxInternal2/SharedFoldersEnableSymlinksCreate/<SHARE_LABEL> 1
For example:
VBoxManage setextradata Debian\ Wheezy VBoxInternal2/SharedFoldersEnableSymlinksCreate/Public 1
To check if your setting has been ‘taken’, run
VBoxManage getextradata MACHINE_LABEL enumerate
Restart the virtual machine and the creation of symlinks should work.
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