Open Source VMFS Driver

This driver enables read-only access to files and folders on partitions formatted with the Virtual Machine File System (VMFS). VMFS is a clustered file system that is used by the VMware ESX hosts to store virtual machines and virtual disk files.

The VMFS driver comes with command line interface (CLI) tools to mount and analyze VMFS volumes. The VMFS driver was tested on Linux and Windows based hosts, but should work on any platform that supports Java. The driver supports VMFS version 3 (VMFS3).

VMFS volumes can also be browsed or mounted using a WebDAV client.

NEW FEATURES in Release r95:

Support for LVM using multiple extents (VMFS that were extended)
Support for sparse files (a.k.a. "thin provisioned" virtual disks)
Auto-detection of VMFS stored in partitions
Enhanced display of symbolic links and raw device mapped (RDM) virtual disks
New CLI commands cat and showheartbeats
Display of cluster heartbeat information
Many issues resolved

Many people asked questions about the driver's performance, and wanted to have a more useful sample scenario - we have heard you, please take a look here.

Also have a look at the Frequently Asked Questions for more details.

The VMFS driver is developed and maintained by fluid Operations and is included in upcoming releases of the eCloudManager product, where it is used to allow enhanced features like offloaded backups of virtual machines hosted on VMware ESX hosts.

How to Run

Please refer to the CLI reference for more details.

How to Build

Please refer to the build instructions for more details.

News and Updates

Follow fluidOps on Twitter: http://twitter.com/fluidops

Acknowledgements

The VMFS WebDAV server is based on the Jetty web server and the Milton WebDAV API. To enable remote volume access over SSH/SFTP the Trilead SSH library is used.

Copyright

Licensing

The source code is placed under the GPL. None of it is shareware. You don't have to pay anyone to use it but you should be sure to read the copyright section of the FAQ for more information on how the GNU General Public License may affect your use of these tools.

In particular, if you intend to use the code in a proprietary (non-GPL'd) application, you will need a proprietary-use license for the VMFS library. This is available for purchase; please contact fluid Operations for more information.

Note that when we say "free" we mean freedom, not price. The goal of such freedom is that the people who use a given piece of software should be able to change it to fit their needs, learn from it, share it with their friends, etc. This license allows you those freedoms, so it is free software.