I'm running Ubuntu 16.04 LTS host with VirtualBox 5.1.38 from Oracle's repository.
I have Ubuntu 18.04.1 LTS guest on this host.
Inside the guest I have installed all needed packages to get Guest Additions (GA) installed successfully – build-essential
, dkms
, linux-headers-generic
.
Then I insert VBoxGuestAdditions_5.1.38.iso
to virtual VM drive and successfully installed it with its autorun prompt.
Then after reboot I see that all GA functionality work as expected, so I have all necessary processes:
$ uname -r
4.15.0-32-generic
$ sudo ps ax | grep -i vbox
442 ? I< 0:00 [iprt-VBoxWQueue]
822 ? Sl 0:00 /usr/sbin/VBoxService --pidfile /var/run/vboxadd-service.sh
1393 ? S 0:00 /usr/bin/VBoxClient --clipboard
1394 ? Sl 0:00 /usr/bin/VBoxClient --clipboard
1398 ? S 0:00 /usr/bin/VBoxClient --checkhostversion
1399 ? S 0:00 /usr/bin/VBoxClient --checkhostversion
1404 ? S 0:00 /usr/bin/VBoxClient --display
1405 ? S 0:00 /usr/bin/VBoxClient --display
1412 ? S 0:00 /usr/bin/VBoxClient --seamless
1413 ? Sl 0:00 /usr/bin/VBoxClient --seamless
1420 ? S 0:00 /usr/bin/VBoxClient --draganddrop
1421 ? Sl 0:00 /usr/bin/VBoxClient --draganddrop
But after next kernel upgrade (as simple as sudo apt update && sudo apt dist-upgrade
) I get the following logs
$ cat /var/log/syslog | grep -i vboxadd
Jan 9 12:01:45 bionic vboxadd.sh: Building the VirtualBox Guest Additions kernel modules.
Jan 9 12:01:45 bionic vboxadd.sh: Building the main Guest Additions module.
Jan 9 12:02:17 bionic vboxadd.sh: .
Jan 9 12:02:17 bionic vboxadd.sh: Building the shared folder support module.
Jan 9 12:02:24 bionic vboxadd.sh: .
Jan 9 12:02:24 bionic vboxadd.sh: Building the graphics driver module.
Jan 9 12:02:32 bionic vboxadd.sh: .
Jan 9 12:02:32 bionic vboxadd.sh: Doing non-kernel setup of the Guest Additions.
and after reboot I see that clipboard and dragandrop are switched off:
$ uname -r
4.15.0-43-generic
$ sudo ps ax | grep -i vbox
428 ? I< 0:00 [iprt-VBoxWQueue]
1404 ? S 0:00 /usr/bin/VBoxClient --checkhostversion
1405 ? S 0:00 /usr/bin/VBoxClient --checkhostversion
1409 ? S 0:00 /usr/bin/VBoxClient --display
1410 ? S 0:00 /usr/bin/VBoxClient --display
1419 ? S 0:00 /usr/bin/VBoxClient --seamless
1912 ? S 0:00 /usr/bin/VBoxClient --seamless
Why does this happen? How to avoid GA re-installation from iso file?
I understand that this problem may be a bit complex, but Ubuntu newbies may expect that it works on VirtualBox without issues, so please do not close this question as off-topic. Kernel updates are released very often so it may become a bit annoying.
Best Answer
Try to remove Guest Additions, installed using the ISO file provided by the host with
and then install the following deb-packages directly available in your guest Ubuntu
This should give you the same features than installing manually the guest addition.