# Issue opening .vtu files in virtual box Ubuntu
**URL:** https://discourse.paraview.org/t/issue-opening-vtu-files-in-virtual-box-ubuntu/14197
**Category:** ParaView Support
**Created:** [March 19, 2024, 10:27am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/issue-opening-vtu-files-in-virtual-box-ubuntu/14197 "2024-03-19T10:27:26Z")
**Posts on this page:** 10
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@cristopher\_morales](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/cristopher_morales)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2024, 10:27am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/issue-opening-vtu-files-in-virtual-box-ubuntu/14197/1 "2024-03-19T10:27:26Z")
Hi all,
I cannot open .vtm and .vtu files in paraview in my virtual machine in Ubuntu 20.04. Have someone experienced some of these issues before? please find attached the error that I got.
ERROR: In ./VTK/Common/ExecutionModel/vtkStreamingDemandDrivenPipeline.cxx, line 817
vtkCompositeDataPipeline (0x5de043205900): No update piece number has been set in the information for output port 0 on algorithm vtkXMLUnstructuredGridReader(0x5de04126ce10).
ERROR: In ./VTK/IO/XMLParser/vtkXMLParser.cxx, line 375
vtkXMLDataParser (0x5de042da4bb0): Error parsing XML in stream at line 33, column 0, byte index 2263: not well-formed (invalid token)
ERROR: In ./VTK/IO/XML/vtkXMLReader.cxx, line 521
vtkXMLUnstructuredGridReader (0x5de04126ce10): Error parsing input file. ReadXMLInformation aborting.
ERROR: In ./VTK/Common/ExecutionModel/vtkExecutive.cxx, line 752
vtkCompositeDataPipeline (0x5de043205900): Algorithm vtkXMLUnstructuredGridReader(0x5de04126ce10) returned failure for request: vtkInformation (0x5de042d8dbb0)
Debug: Off
Modified Time: 307625
Reference Count: 1
Registered Events: (none)
Request: REQUEST\_INFORMATION
ALGORITHM\_AFTER\_FORWARD: 1
FORWARD\_DIRECTION: 0
ERROR: In ./VTK/IO/XMLParser/vtkXMLParser.cxx, line 375
vtkXMLDataParser (0x5de042da4bb0): Error parsing XML in stream at line 33, column 0, byte index 2258: not well-formed (invalid token)
ERROR: In ./VTK/IO/XML/vtkXMLReader.cxx, line 521
vtkXMLUnstructuredGridReader (0x5de04126ce10): Error parsing input file. ReadXMLInformation aborting.
ERROR: In ./VTK/Common/ExecutionModel/vtkExecutive.cxx, line 752
vtkCompositeDataPipeline (0x5de043205900): Algorithm vtkXMLUnstructuredGridReader(0x5de04126ce10) returned failure for request: vtkInformation (0x5de042d8dbb0)
Debug: Off
Modified Time: 307625
Reference Count: 1
Registered Events: (none)
Request: REQUEST\_INFORMATION
ALGORITHM\_AFTER\_FORWARD: 1
FORWARD\_DIRECTION: 0
ERROR: In ./VTK/IO/XMLParser/vtkXMLParser.cxx, line 375
vtkXMLDataParser (0x5de042da4bb0): Error parsing XML in stream at line 33, column 0, byte index 2258: not well-formed (invalid token)
ERROR: In ./VTK/IO/XML/vtkXMLReader.cxx, line 521
vtkXMLUnstructuredGridReader (0x5de04126ce10): Error parsing input file. ReadXMLInformation aborting.
ERROR: In ./VTK/Common/ExecutionModel/vtkExecutive.cxx, line 752
vtkCompositeDataPipeline (0x5de043205900): Algorithm vtkXMLUnstructuredGridReader(0x5de04126ce10) returned failure for request: vtkInformation (0x5de042d8dbb0)
Debug: Off
Modified Time: 307625
Reference Count: 1
Registered Events: (none)
Request: REQUEST\_INFORMATION
ALGORITHM\_AFTER\_FORWARD: 1
FORWARD\_DIRECTION: 0
ERROR: In ./VTK/IO/XMLParser/vtkXMLParser.cxx, line 375
vtkXMLDataParser (0x5de042da4bb0): Error parsing XML in stream at line 33, column 0, byte index 2258: not well-formed (invalid token)
ERROR: In ./VTK/IO/XML/vtkXMLReader.cxx, line 521
vtkXMLUnstructuredGridReader (0x5de04126ce10): Error parsing input file. ReadXMLInformation aborting.
ERROR: In ./VTK/Common/ExecutionModel/vtkExecutive.cxx, line 752
vtkCompositeDataPipeline (0x5de043205900): Algorithm vtkXMLUnstructuredGridReader(0x5de04126ce10) returned failure for request: vtkInformation (0x5de042d8dbb0)
Debug: Off
Modified Time: 307625
Reference Count: 1
Registered Events: (none)
Request: REQUEST\_INFORMATION
ALGORITHM\_AFTER\_FORWARD: 1
FORWARD\_DIRECTION: 0
ERROR: In ./VTK/IO/XMLParser/vtkXMLParser.cxx, line 375
vtkXMLDataParser (0x5de042da4bb0): Error parsing XML in stream at line 33, column 0, byte index 2269: not well-formed (invalid token)
ERROR: In ./VTK/IO/XML/vtkXMLReader.cxx, line 521
vtkXMLUnstructuredGridReader (0x5de04126ce10): Error parsing input file. ReadXMLInformation aborting.
ERROR: In ./VTK/Common/ExecutionModel/vtkExecutive.cxx, line 752
vtkCompositeDataPipeline (0x5de043205900): Algorithm vtkXMLUnstructuredGridReader(0x5de04126ce10) returned failure for request: vtkInformation (0x5de042d8dbb0)
Debug: Off
Modified Time: 307625
Reference Count: 1
Registered Events: (none)
Request: REQUEST\_INFORMATION
ALGORITHM\_AFTER\_FORWARD: 1
FORWARD\_DIRECTION: 0
Thank you so much in advance.
Cristopher Morales Ubal
---
### Author:  [@mwestphal](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/mwestphal)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2024, 10:32am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/issue-opening-vtu-files-in-virtual-box-ubuntu/14197/2 "2024-03-19T10:32:15Z")
Please share your files.
---
### Author:  [@cristopher\_morales](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/cristopher_morales)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2024, 10:42am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/issue-opening-vtu-files-in-virtual-box-ubuntu/14197/3 "2024-03-19T10:42:04Z")
[vol\_solution.vtu](https://discourse.paraview.org/uploads/short-url/5NdstOmLesydbxLFgddwlK3A7LH.vtu) (441.9 KB)
---
### Author:  [@mwestphal](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/mwestphal)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2024, 12:31pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/issue-opening-vtu-files-in-virtual-box-ubuntu/14197/4 "2024-03-19T12:31:54Z")
Works fine using the ParaView 5.12.0 binary release: [https://www.paraview.org/download/](https://www.paraview.org/download/)
---
### Author:  [@cristopher\_morales](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/cristopher_morales)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2024, 2:05pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/issue-opening-vtu-files-in-virtual-box-ubuntu/14197/5 "2024-03-19T14:05:07Z")
Thank you so much for your answer. So it might be an issue in the virtual box related to encoding. Anyways, thanks!!!
---
### Author:  [@cory.quammen](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/cory.quammen)
#### Post date: [March 19, 2024, 3:39pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/issue-opening-vtu-files-in-virtual-box-ubuntu/14197/6 "2024-03-19T15:39:02Z")
How did you install ParaView?
---
### Author:  [@cristopher\_morales](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/cristopher_morales)
#### Post date: [March 20, 2024, 2:31pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/issue-opening-vtu-files-in-virtual-box-ubuntu/14197/7 "2024-03-20T14:31:01Z")
Hi
Thank you so much for your answer, my apologies for my late reply,
I used
sudo apt install paraview
I am not sure if that is the right way of installing paraview. But I also cannot open the .vtu file in the texteditor, it gives the following error:
The file you opened has some invalid characters. If you continue editing this file you could corrupt this document.
You can also choose another character encoding and try again.
I use UTF-8.
I would really appreciate any advice about dealing with these errors.
Best regards,
Cristopher Morales Ubal
---
### Author:  [@cristopher\_morales](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/cristopher_morales)
#### Post date: [March 20, 2024, 4:02pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/issue-opening-vtu-files-in-virtual-box-ubuntu/14197/8 "2024-03-20T16:02:24Z")
I can open the .vtu files in windows, so something wrong might be in my virtual box. I have also checked with the command file in linux and I got the following :
Which I think is incorrect.
---
### Author:  [@cory.quammen](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/cory.quammen)
#### Post date: [March 20, 2024, 4:57pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/issue-opening-vtu-files-in-virtual-box-ubuntu/14197/9 "2024-03-20T16:57:21Z")
It would be useful to know if a linux download from [https://www.paraview.org/download/](https://www.paraview.org/download/) works fine.
---
### Author:  [@cristopher\_morales](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/cristopher_morales)
#### Post date: [March 25, 2024, 9:45am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/issue-opening-vtu-files-in-virtual-box-ubuntu/14197/10 "2024-03-25T09:45:39Z")
Hi
I have downloaded and installed Paraview from the website,
When I follow the installation procedure depicted in this tutorial:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWEGjWD8d2M](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWEGjWD8d2M)
I cannot create a launcher after I add the following lines in paraview.desktop:
[Desktop Entry]
Version=1.0
Name=ParaView 5.12
Exec=paraview
Terminal=false
Icon=/opt/ParaView-5.12/share/icons/hicolor/96×96/apps/paraview.png
Type=Application
x-Ayatana-Desktop-Shortcuts=NewWindow
[NewWindow Shortcut Group]
Name=New Window
Exec=paraview
TargetEnvironment=Unity
However, if I go to opt/Paraview-5.12/bin/ and double click to paraview , I can open Paraview and open the .vtu file.
Do you have some advice of how to fix this this?
When I save paraview.desktop, I got the following warnings that might be related to the issue:
\*\* (gedit:11687): WARNING \*\*: 11:44:00.212: Set document metadata failed: Setting attribute metadata::gedit-spell-language not supported
\*\* (gedit:11687): WARNING \*\*: 11:44:00.213: Set document metadata failed: Setting attribute metadata::gedit-encoding not supported
Thank you so much in advance,
Best regards,
Cristopher Morales Ubal