none as non-root: Unable to load config: stat: stat config.json: permission denied

[hussnainjav3d]

The exact command to reproduce the issue:
minikube start --vm-driver=virtualbox

The full output of the command that failed:

E0319 15:43:50.410596 17940 notify.go:66] write time failed: Error writing current update time to file: : writefile failed for /home/hussnain/.minikube/last_update_check: open /home/hussnain/.minikube/last_update_check: permission denied
🎉 minikube 1.8.2 is available! Download it: https://github.com/kubernetes/minikube/releases/tag/v1.8.2
💡 To disable this notice, run: 'minikube config set WantUpdateNotification false'

🙄 minikube v1.7.3 on Ubuntu 18.04
💣 Unable to load config: stat: stat /home/hussnain/.minikube/profiles/minikube/config.json: permission denied

The output of the minikube logs command:

The operating system version:
Linux javed 5.3.0-40-generic #32~18.04.1-Ubuntu SMP Mon Feb 3 14:05:59 UTC 2020 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

[tstromberg]

Can you share the output of:

• id
• stat /home/hussnain/.minikube/profiles/minikube/config.json
• touch /home/hussnain/.minikube/profiles/minikube/config.json

Thank you!

[tstromberg]

My guess is that the files are not owned by the user you are running minikube as.

[habib-ali]

I am facing the same issue. I used minikube installation guide to install minikube on my ubuntu 18.04.
I have installed docker on my system and used "none" as a vm-driver to start minikube.
Output of
minikube start --vm-driver=none
is this
😄 minikube v1.8.2 on Ubuntu 18.04
💣 Unable to load config: stat: stat /home/healyhwire/.minikube/profiles/minikube/config.json: permission denied

upon doing
stat /home/healyhwire/.minikube/profiles/minikube/config.json
it says
stat: cannot stat '/home/healyhwire/.minikube/profiles/minikube/config.json': Permission denied

I have checked owner of the file using sudo ls -al /home/healyhwire/.minikube/profiles/minikube/config.json and found that owner is root

Please suggest me what can I do to solve this issue. If I try to copy this file to make myself as owner it cannot access file even to copy it.

[mancini0]

I'm hitting the same issue on 18.04 following this guide https://www.howtoforge.com/how-to-install-kubernetes-with-minikube-on-ubuntu-1804-lts/

[tstromberg]

@habib-ali - Thank you! We can improve that error message. Using --vm-driver=none requires sudo, at least until #3760 is fixed.

[habib-ali]

@tstromberg I tried to use sudo to start minikube cluster but I think it is causing issues in next processes. e.g I am exposing a service using kubectl to be used by minikube using the following sample commands
kubectl create deployment hello-minikube --image=k8s.gcr.io/echoserver:1.4
kubectl expose deployment hello-minikube --type=NodePort --port=8080
and then I do
sudo minikube service hello-minikube
It generates the following output (after some research I found out that browser do not support to be opened as root)

|-----------|----------------|-------------|------------------------------|
| NAMESPACE | NAME | TARGET PORT | URL |
|-----------|----------------|-------------|------------------------------|
| default | hello-minikube | | http://192.168.100.108:30754 |
|-----------|----------------|-------------|------------------------------|
🎉 Opening service default/hello-minikube in default browser...
[1165:1165:0322/095515.027297:ERROR:zygote_host_impl_linux.cc(89)] Running as root without --no-sandbox is not supported. See https://crbug.com/638180.
[1175:1175:0322/095515.067753:ERROR:zygote_host_impl_linux.cc(89)] Running as root without --no-sandbox is not supported. See https://crbug.com/638180.
Running Firefox as root in a regular user's session is not supported. ($HOME is /home/healyhwire which is owned by healyhwire.)
/usr/bin/xdg-open: 851: /usr/bin/xdg-open: iceweasel: not found
/usr/bin/xdg-open: 851: /usr/bin/xdg-open: seamonkey: not found
/usr/bin/xdg-open: 851: /usr/bin/xdg-open: mozilla: not found
/usr/bin/xdg-open: 851: /usr/bin/xdg-open: epiphany: not found
/usr/bin/xdg-open: 851: /usr/bin/xdg-open: konqueror: not found
/usr/bin/xdg-open: 851: /usr/bin/xdg-open: chromium: not found
/usr/bin/xdg-open: 851: /usr/bin/xdg-open: chromium-browser: not found
[1212:1212:0322/095515.262484:ERROR:zygote_host_impl_linux.cc(89)] Running as root without --no-sandbox is not supported. See https://crbug.com/638180.
/usr/bin/xdg-open: 851: /usr/bin/xdg-open: www-browser: not found
/usr/bin/xdg-open: 851: /usr/bin/xdg-open: links2: not found
/usr/bin/xdg-open: 851: /usr/bin/xdg-open: elinks: not found
/usr/bin/xdg-open: 851: /usr/bin/xdg-open: links: not found
/usr/bin/xdg-open: 851: /usr/bin/xdg-open: lynx: not found
/usr/bin/xdg-open: 851: /usr/bin/xdg-open: w3m: not found
xdg-open: no method available for opening 'http://192.168.100.108:30754'

💣 open url failed: http://192.168.100.108:30754: exit status 3

😿 minikube is exiting due to an error. If the above message is not useful, open an issue:
👉 https://github.com/kubernetes/minikube/issues/new/choose

If I run minikube service without sudo, it generate other permission errors.