Upgraded to 6.1.16, Export Appliance crashes

[JaimeC]

Ever since I upgraded VIrtualBox from 6.1.14 to 6.1.16 I have been unable to export (backup) my various appliances. Running Ubuntu Linux Bionic 18.04.5LTS. Has anyone else seen this error?

[scottgus1]

Haven't seen the error yet, but just a word of advice: Export != Backup.

Exporting and cloning aren't recommended for backing up a VM. Either process changes some guest settings, and a change in the guest means there's no way to confirm the backup. One big change is UUIDs, which can interfere with activation or grub loaders.

The best backup of a Virtualbox guest is a full file & folder copy of a completely shut-down (not save-stated) guest folder, containing all the files therein, as well as any disk files that may reside outside the folder. The backup can be FC file-compared, or hashes can be taken and compared for off-site backup where FC would not be practical. If the disk file(s) are inside the folder right next to the guest's .vbox file, then that backup can be restored to any capable Virtualbox host running any supported host OS. If a disk file is outside the guest folder, then the .vbox file contains an absolute path to the disk file, and that path must be re-created on the new host (or the .vbox file needs to be manually edited). Virtualbox 6.0 and later allow moving a disk file into the guest folder next to the .vbox file, using the main Virtualbox window's File menu, Virtual Media Manager, Move command.

[scottgus1]

Also, we'd need to know what error you're getting so we could have a chance to help diagnose.

[JaimeC]

I get a pop-up box that says: Failed to prepare the export of the appliance.

When I click on the "Details" arrow I see:

Callee RC:
NS_ERROR_ABORT (0x80004004)

[scottgus1]

If you downgrade back to 6.1.14, does export start working again?

[JaimeC]

Crap. No. I just finished trying that. Getting the same error even with 6.1.14. It worked fine last weekend when I exported all of my appliances so something somewhere must've gotten corrupted...

[JaimeC]

More information: The problem seems to be isolated to my OS/2 Warp appliance. I have no problem importing or exporting my Linux or Windows appliances. I can import a previously exported OS/2 Warp appliance, but once imported I cannot export it again. Not sure WHY that should be a problem but that seems to be it. Tried it on two different machines and it behaves the same way on each one.