Can't import .ova to VirtualBox and can't uncompress with `tar`

Question

Having a problem with a ova file that is supposed to contain a VM image.

Importing into VirtualBox gives the error:

OVA 'path/to/filename.ova' does not contain an .ovf-file.

Result Code: VBOX_E_FILE_ERROR (0x80BB0004)
Component: ApplianceWrap
Interface: IAppliance {86a98347-7619-41aa-aece-b21ac5c1a7e6}

Using tar to extract the ovf also does not work:

$ tar -xvf filename.ova
tar: This does not look like a tar archive
tar: Exiting with failure status due to previous errors

It all looks as though the file format is incorrect, but it has been imported successfully by others on my course so it seems unlikely.

I am unsure how to further troubleshoot this issue and any help would be appreciated.

Answer 1

It looks like the OVA has been truncated or is missing some portion. Check the file size and checksum of the OVA file to ensure that it has not been corrupted during download or transfer.