Bug 555582

Summary:	app-emulation/virtualbox-4.3.28 upgrade aborts with permission problems and forgets settings
Product:	Gentoo Linux	Reporter:	Mike Mattie <codermattie>
Component:	Current packages	Assignee:	Lars Wendler (Polynomial-C) (RETIRED) <polynomial-c>
Status:	RESOLVED OBSOLETE
Severity:	normal	CC:	bkohler, patrick
Priority:	Normal
Version:	unspecified
Hardware:	All
OS:	Linux
Whiteboard:
Package list:		Runtime testing required:	---
Attachments:	vbox-start.log

Description Mike Mattie 2015-07-21 21:28:45 UTC

VirtualBox upgrade to 4.3.28 broke totally. Some VM configurations were completely reset.

VirtualBox failed to run with error:

"NS_ERROR_FACTORY_NOT_REGISTERED" and refused to create a session.

a google search turned up this entry from the VirtualBox site:

https://www.virtualbox.org/ticket/3568

this indicates a permissions problem.

Fix: 
  1. change  /usr/lib64/virtualbox/VBox to setuid root.
  2. Run setuid and launch a vm ( launching may not be necessary )
  3. disable setuid root.
  4. run normally.

It seems that virtualbox is able to fix itself with root permissions and unprivelaged runs subsequently succeed.


Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. completely uninstall virtualbox
2. install virtualbox and run. it stops with the NS_ERROR_FACTORY_NOT_REGISTERED error
3. toggle on setuid root. run again. ( fixes it )
4. toggle off setuid root. run again and now it works correctly.
Actual Results:  
I was able to work around a installation problem.

Expected Results:  
installed correctly with needed permissions available to virtualbox as a unprivelaged user.

Comment 1 Andrey Aleksandrovich 2015-08-17 12:00:46 UTC

Created attachment 409254 [details]
vbox-start.log

I have this error. Of course the modules are loaded. I can make new virtual machine but after closing VirtualBox I don't see it. However, if I delete ~/.VirtualBox it shows warning that it can't find virtual machine (previously created). I don't understand what's going on...

ps hardened/linux/amd64/no-multilib

Comment 2 Ben Kohler gentoo-dev

2017-08-31 18:19:01 UTC

Please reopen if this is still a problem on current versions