Compacting .vmdk virtual disk with VirtualBox

VirtualBox is able to compact (reduce the size) .vdi images, but it is not possible with .vmdk disk images. So…

…we can compact .vmdk files if we detach, convert to .vdi, compact, convert back to .vmdk and attack again to the original vitual machine:

$ vboxmanage storageattach VM --storagectl SATA --port 0 --device 0 --type hdd --medium none
$ vboxmanage clonehd --format vdi ~/VMs/VM-disk1.vmdk /tmp/VM-disk1.vdi
$ vboxmanage closemedium disk ~/VMs/VM-disk1.vmdk --delete
$ vboxmanage modifyhd /tmp/VM-disk1.vdi --compact
$ vboxmanage clonehd --format vmdk /tmp/VM-disk1.vdi ~/VMs/VM-disk1.vmdk
$ vboxmanage closemedium disk /tmp/VM-disk1.vdi --delete
$ vboxmanage storageattach VM --storagectl SATA --port 0 --device 0 --type hdd --medium 4/VMs/VM-disk1.vmdk

CLI power again…