Vmfs-tools May 2026

sudo mkdir /mnt/vmfs sudo vmfs-fuse /dev/sdb2 /mnt/vmfs -o ro After mounting, you’ll see a standard VMFS directory structure:

| Command | Purpose | |---------|---------| | vmfs-fuse | Mount a VMFS partition via FUSE (user-space) for read-only access | | vmfsfsck | Check and validate VMFS filesystem metadata (read-only) | | vmfsrestore | Experimental tool to copy files from VMFS to another location | Step 1: Identify the VMFS Partition Use lsblk or fdisk to find the correct partition (type 0xFB for VMFS). vmfs-tools

/mnt/vmfs/ ├── .fdc.sf/ ├── .sdd.sf/ └── <datastore_name>/ ├── .vSphere-HA/ ├── <vm_folder>/ │ ├── .vmdk, .vmx, .vmsd, etc. └── ... Use standard cp , rsync , or dd to recover data: sudo mkdir /mnt/vmfs sudo vmfs-fuse /dev/sdb2 /mnt/vmfs -o

sudo fdisk -l /dev/sdb Example output:

cp -r /mnt/vmfs/datastore1/my_vm /recovery/path/ sudo umount /mnt/vmfs 6. Advanced Use Cases Recover from a Disk Image (DD or E01) # Create a raw disk image (if disk is failing, use ddrescue) sudo dd if=/dev/sdb of=/recovery/esxi_disk.img bs=4M status=progress Mount the image via loopback with offset sudo losetup -f --show -o $((2048*512)) /recovery/esxi_disk.img (Find offset using: fdisk -lu /recovery/esxi_disk.img) sudo vmfs-fuse /dev/loop0 /mnt/vmfs List VMFS Extents (for spanned volumes) vmfsfsck -l /dev/sdb2 Experimental Write Support (Use with Extreme Caution) # Compile from source with --enable-write ./configure --enable-write make sudo make install Mount read-write (risky) sudo vmfs-fuse /dev/sdb2 /mnt/vmfs -o rw Use standard cp , rsync , or dd