How can I set up a VirtualBox interface using a Python library in 2022?

I have a local installation of VirtualBox running on my host machine, which is running Windows 10. I am able to start and run a virtual machine of Ubuntu via the VirtualBox GUI application.

I need to be able to manage the state of that virtual machine using python. As far as I know, the only routes for me to pursue this are:

• virtualbox-python library on Github (last active 2020, build failing)
• vboxapi library on PyPi (last active 2012, build failing)
• virtual-machines-python-manage, which I have not attempted to use since it requires Azure services (which eventually require a paid subscription)

Using this very similar post from June 2017, which was answered by the vboxapi maintainer/virtualbox-python repo hoster at that time, I've surmised that the process should be to easily import the virtualbox or vboxapi libraries.

However, when I run a function of either library, I receive the error No module named 'vboxapi'.

To fix this, I should be able to:

1. Go to VirtualBox's downloads page (https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads) and download the VirtualBox SDK.
2. Extract the zip file.
3. Navigate into the subdirectory 'sdk\installer'
4. Open command prompt in this subdirectory using Administrator mode.
5. Run python vboxapisetup.py install.

This should install vboxapi, but instead I receive the following error:

C:\Users\PATH_HERE\VirtualBoxSDK-6.1.30-148432\sdk\installer>python vboxapisetup.py install
Cleaning COM cache at C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\PythonSoftwareFoundation.Python.3.9_3.9.2544.0_x64__qbz5n2kfra8p0\Lib\site-packages\win32com\gen_py and C:\Users\USER_HERE\AppData\Local\Temp\gen_py
running install
running build
running build_py
copying vboxapi\__init__.py -> build\lib\vboxapi
running install_lib
creating C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\PythonSoftwareFoundation.Python.3.9_3.9.2544.0_x64__qbz5n2kfra8p0\Lib\site-packages\vboxapi
error: could not create 'C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\PythonSoftwareFoundation.Python.3.9_3.9.2544.0_x64__qbz5n2kfra8p0\Lib\site-packages\vboxapi': Access is denied

Is this a Path error? Am I overlooking something simple in environmental variables?

This post for the same problem on a ubuntu host machine suggests running the following commands:

export VBOX_INSTALL_PATH=$(which VirtualBox)
sudo -E python vboxapisetup.py install

Is there a windows equivalent method I can try here?

So I was never able to directly run any sort of VirtualBox management software from within python: none of the libraries listed worked for me.

Instead, what I ended up doing was execute bash shell scripts that called VBoxManage and each subsequent command needed. I then had to pipe the results (text output to the terminal from VBoxManage) back into Python and parse the text.