Mouse support for Ubuntu in Virtualbox

After I installed the virtualbox additions on my Ubuntu VM in the Windows XP host, I discovered that the mouse sharing between the host and guest does not work properly. So after searching through the web, I found some workarounds. This is one of the solutions from Kirya [.net] and over here, I am noting it for my own reference.

Simply add the following lines in /etc/X11/xorg.conf,

Section "InputDevice"
   Identifier   "Configured Mouse"
   Driver       "vboxmouse"
   Option       "CorePointer"
EndSection

After that, restart your Ubuntu VM and your mouse will be working fine. Please read the post in Kirya [.net] if you encounter any video driver problem.

Installing AWN on Ubuntu 8.10 Guest VM…

Looking at the screenshots I found on the web, I realized the AWN is really cool! Now, I wanted to try doing it on my Virtual Ubuntu!

Reading the prerequisite, I realized that the “Composite” component in the X installation must first be enabled. Then from the Visual Effects column, I discovered that Compriz is not supported in virtual environment. So, I went on enabling metacity’s compositor to use AWN instead.

To enable metacity’s compositor:

Alt+F2

and type

gconf-editor

and press the enter key.

Go to Apps > Metacity > General and look for compositing_manager. Check the checkbox beside it and it will allow you to use AWN even without Compriz.

Next, to install AWN, simply type

apt-get install avant-window-navigator

Failed to Export Virtual Appliance: An item with the same key has already been added

Today, I was trying to export a virtual appliance from the ESXi Server Failed to Export Virtual Appliance: An item with the same key has already been added error messages. So, I went on searching the VMware Communities to look for some solutions. To my surprise, I discovered that we can’t export the appliance that is in snapshot state. And, I have to consolidate the snapshot states by removing all other snapshots…  then the export feature starts to work now!! I am just wondering.. wouldn’t it be great if we can export it with all the snapshots too? On the second thought… Probably not, as that’s not the purpose of Virtual Appliance.

VMTools installations: "Directory of C header files" error

Today, I received an error message, “… location of the directory of C header files that match your running kernel? [/usr/src/…” while installing VM tools on my new Linux Virtual Machine, Fedora 9.

I found a solution in Fedora forum….

First, you need to install the kernel-devel package.

yum install kernel-devel

Then, re-run the vmware perl script again.

./vmware-install.pl