Trying to copy files from a BTRFS partition but need permission/ownership

[Raik]

First, thank you so much for your time and patience. Newish to Linux and the terminal still, here is the issue I have, Windows busted my Manjaro install for the last time so I’m going full Linux this time but need my 43GB Windows libvirt image back and some other files.
The partition is Btrfs — Mounted at /run/media/USER/root
Already did a sudo chown $USER:$USER /run/media/USER/root as told by a similar solution in these fine forum but I still see a lock in the terminal and I’m unable to copy my files like /run/media/replica/root/@/var/lib/libvirt
What can I do now?

Again thank you for the time and effort to help for such a trivial matter, anyways have a wonderful day!

[Kobold]

@Raik

Newish to Linux and the terminal still, here is the issue I have

1. New user’s should not use BTRFS. New user’s should use EXT4 Partitions.

2. Btrfs is a Filesystem for Linux Veterans and for people who is open to learn the latest little detail, because you can run into deep problems if you don’t know what are you doing.

3. At the end of the day its your choice… just choose wisely

Edit:
If you still looking for help, i recommend to post your system Info’s (as code).

inxi --admin --verbosity=5 --filter --no-host --width

[varikonniemi]

@Raik

sudo chown $USER:$USER /run/media/USER/root

it should be

sudo chown $USER:$USER /run/media/$USER/root

[Nachlese]

/run is not a good choice for this - create a directory under /mnt for example
/run is a temporary directory and permission changes (or any other changes) will not stick, will not survive a reboot

first change the permission of the mount point - then mount the device to it
not the other way around

if you are root, permissions do not matter - you can just copy from wherever to wherever and worry about permissions later

ps:
and, what I just noticed:

@Raik

I’m unable to copy my files like /run/media/replica/root/@/var/lib/libvirt

That is normal - you as a regular user do not have permission to read many of the files/directories in there, perhaps can not even open the directory /var/lib/libvirt itself
That has got nothing to do with the permission of the mount point.
Do your copying as root, then permissions won’t matter.

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it remains that
BTRFS is an enigma wrapped in a mystery to me …

[BG405]

@Nachlese

/run is a temporary directory and permission changes (or any other changes) will not stick, will not survive a reboot

↑ This ↑

… and the fact that the directory, at least, if mounted in /run/media should already be “owned” by $USER.

What I’d do:

• Create a mountpoint in your /home e.g. mkdir ~/testmount
• Mount your partition there
• Take ownership recursively e.g.:
  sudo chown -R $USER:$USER testmount

… but before doing any of this, take heed of the comments above about btrfs. I have zero experience with this; use my suggestions at your own risk.

[Aragorn]

@BG405

What I’d do:

• Create a mountpoint in your /home e.g. mkdir ~/.testmount
• Mount your partition there
• Take ownership recursively e.g.:
  sudo chown -R $USER:$USER testmount

Can you spot your mistake? (And no, it doesn’t have anything to so with btrfs. )

Clue

~/.testmount is not the same thing as ~/testmount.

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@Raik

What can I do now?

Please read…

[Tutorial] Understanding and working with UNIX filesystems and permissions

Difficulty: ★★★☆☆ Note: This post is meant as a tutorial. Please do not post on this thread regarding any problems you’re having with permissions, but start a new thread instead. Thank you. PREAMBLE: THE HISTORICAL BACKGROUND If you are new to the world of GNU/Linux ─ and especially if you come from the Microsoft Windows ecosystem ─ then you will undoubtedly have already noticed that GNU/Linux handles permissions and storage volumes quite differently from what you might be used to …

[BG405]

OOPS habit when I deal with stuff in /home: it’s practically all I use it for! (config files).

Edited accordingly.

[Raik]

Thanks for the comment. BTRFS ain’t that hard. Quite the experience and the instant snapshots and even accessible from GRUB are worth it imho.

By newish I mean I don’t have experience in Linux being broke. It usually always is Windows breaking my dualboot and apps being obfuscated for WINE so I lack experience in fixing some things because Linux usually works or someone already fixed it.

@varikonniemi Thanks a lot! I actually got it wrong from the forums but can’t reply a dead thread.

@Nachlese That did the trick as well as fixing the problem between the keyboard and the seat… for some reason I could not access the files because nautilus was ‘keeping the volume busy’ but restarting the system solved everything. Thank you so much for the help!

@BG405 Will do next time

@Aragorn Yeah. Unfortunately that was the syntax error from elsewhere Thanks for the tutorial