{"id":956394,"date":"2026-11-03T06:10:09","date_gmt":"2026-11-03T06:10:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/956394\/"},"modified":"2026-11-03T06:10:09","modified_gmt":"2026-11-03T06:10:09","slug":"architect-creates-open-source-replacement-for-vm-migration-tool-vmware-has-hidden","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/956394\/","title":{"rendered":"Architect creates open-source replacement for VM migration tool VMware has hidden"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

\n virtualization\n <\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

\n OpenVDDK is reportedly already being used in production, at scale\n <\/p>\n

A cloud architect has created an open-source alternative to VMware\u2019s Virtual Disk Development Kit (VDDK), which the virtualization giant recently withdrew from public downloads.<\/p>\n

VMware describes<\/a> VDDK as \u201ca set of libraries and utilities that enable software developers to create applications that can access and manipulate virtual disks\u201d and \u201ca valuable tool for developers of storage and backup applications.\u201d<\/p>\n

Users, along with VMware\u2019s rivals, had another use for VDDK: migrating VMs to alternative virtualization platforms.<\/p>\n

In August, VMware restricted access to VDDK downloads<\/a> to its partners, meaning VMware customers couldn\u2019t access the tool and some of its rivals\u2019 migration tools became less effective.<\/p>\n

Cloud architect Andrija Pani\u0107 decided to do something about it.<\/p>\n

\u201cMany tools that have nothing in common except VMware use the same small library to read a virtual machine\u2019s disks: virt-v2v and nbdkit, the importers in Forklift\/MTV, Proxmox VE and Apache CloudStack, and countless in-house scripts,\u201d he told The Register by email. \u201cWhen public VDDK downloads ended, all of them became harder to install and run.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t think it was fair that people\u2019s ability to move or protect their own data should depend on a download page.\u201d<\/p>\n

He describes the project as \u201can independent drop-in for libvixDiskLib.so.8.0.3, the disk library that VMware backup and migration tools load to read virtual disks. It was written from scratch, using only public documentation and black-box testing, and contains no VMware code.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pani\u0107 told The Register he wrote the tool in Go, with a thin C layer that exposes exactly the same C interface, library name and symbol versions as VMware\u2019s code.<\/p>\n

The tool cannot write disks, just read them for backup and migration purposes.<\/p>\n

In his email to The Register, Pani\u0107 said he has successfully tested OpenVDDK on vSphere versions 6.7 U3, 7.0.3, 8.0.3, 9.1.1. He said that tests in his lab with the latter version, accessing OpenVDDK through vCenter on a standalone ESXi host, saw every disk read match.<\/p>\n

\u201cIndependent testers have reported successful use with Forklift (VMware to KubeVirt, cold and warm), MTV on OpenShift (cold and warm), a Proxmox VE pipeline and custom nbdkit-based tools,\u201d the architect told The Register. \u201cI’ve received reports of production use, including a German cloud provider migrating a large file server with V2K Migrate and a US-based company migrating to Apache CloudStack\/KVM.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pani\u0107 was at pains to point out that the reports of successful use are \u201cnot independently audited customer endorsements or a guarantee of suitability for every production environment.\u201d As is often the case with FOSS tools.<\/p>\n

OpenVDDK is not the only option for migrating away from VMware without VDDK. KVM-based OpenNebula has a tool called OneSwap<\/a> that it says has a 96 percent success rate. Nutanix recently tweaked<\/a> its \u201cMove\u201d migration tool so it can do the job without VDDK. Red Hat is working on a fix but has provided details of a workaround<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Pani\u0107 made OpenVDDK available under an Apache license, so perhaps Red Hat and others will find it useful as they re-jig their VM migration tools. \u00ae<\/p>\n

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