[Call for Testers] VirtualBox 4.3.2: does not start

[Bernhard Fröhlich]

Am 27.11.2013 13:09 schrieb "Matthias Apitz" <guru at unixarea.de>:
>
> El día Wednesday, November 27, 2013 a las 07:51:41AM +0100, Matthias
Apitz escribió:
>
> > The command;
> >
> > # sudo -u guru VirtualBox
> >
> > let show up and error dialog box with the message
> >
> > Failed to create the VirtualBox COM object
> >
> > The application will now terminate.
> >
> > Details:
> > Callee RC: NS_ERROR_ABORT (0x80004004)
>
> It seems to be a bit tricky to get that beast up and running:
> Here is what I got to know so far:
>
> - one must be in the group 'vboxusers'

What should I say? Please read pkg-message first.

> - one must 'unset QT_PLUGIN_PATH' (at least in KDE4 environment)
>   this will solve the SEGFAULT crash;

That sounds new to me but is definitely something we should look at and
talk to the kde team about. This sounds a lot like a workstound you have
found.

> - one must create by hand(!) a dir ~/.VirtualBox and there a file:
>   $ cat .VirtualBox/VirtualBox.xml
>   <VirtualBox xmlns="http://www.innotek.de/VirtualBox-settings"
>   version="1.12-freebsd">
>   </VirtualBox>

Yeah that seems to be a bug in 10 and there is a PR about it. Vbox tries to
open or create the xml configfile which always worked fine before but is
causing some file does not exist error on 10 now.

>   after this there is a least a log about the booting:
>
>   $ cat .VirtualBox/VBoxSVC.log
>   VirtualBox XPCOM Server 4.3.2_OSE r90405 freebsd.x86 (Nov 20 2013
14:00:44) release log
>   00:00:00.005135 main     Log opened 2013-11-27T10:55:17.598220000Z
>   00:00:00.005137 main     Build Type: release
>   00:00:00.005139 main     OS Product: FreeBSD
>   00:00:00.005141 main     OS Release: 10.0-ALPHA4
>   00:00:00.005143 main     OS Version: FreeBSD 10.0-ALPHA4 #1: Fri Oct 18
12:10:57 CEST 2013     guru at aurora.Sisis.de:/usr/obj/usr/src/sys/GENERIC
>   00:00:00.005145 main     Host RAM: 2027MB total, 1864MB available
>   00:00:00.005147 main     Executable: /usr/local/lib/virtualbox/VBoxSVC
>   00:00:00.005149 main     Process ID: 9104
>   00:00:00.005151 main     Package type: BSD_32BITS_GENERIC (OSE)
>
>
> but even with this you will get the above error message when yoyu start
> as normal user VirtualBox;
>
> it seems (Google) that the 10.x kernel need a special option:
>
> option COMPAT_FREEBSD32
> (see: http://www.freebsdonline.com/content/view/888/528/ for example);
> I have not yet tested it, due to lack of time installing a new kernel;

That is an requirement on amd64 that existed from the beginning so really
nothing new. Was this option removed from GENERIC in 10 or do you just use
your own custom kernel?

> maybe the maintainer could spend a few words if this is required, or
> what else is missing to bring this up in 10.x; thx

To be honest I still would not recommend to run vbox on 10. We are
currently testing vbox mostly on 9.2 and try to ensure that it works fine
there. On 10 there are quite a few new issues open that vbox only seems to
trigger and the schedule for 10 is so tight that I don't see a chance to
get them fixed before the release. In general 10 does not seem to be high
priority on any vbox todo list either because I don't see anyone fixing or
even working on any of the known issues. So for now I would try to avoid
vbox on 10 unless you want to work on improving it. We might catch up in a
few months time I guess.