broken VBoxManage in VirtualBox 4.3.6 ?

[Jerry Kemp]

I am running VirtualBox 4.3.6 using OpenIndiana as a host system.

.........................................
# uname -a
SunOS u20m3 5.11 oi_151a7 i86pc i386 i86pc
.........................................

I have a dozen different VM's installed/configured thru the VirtualBox GUI, and
they all work great.

So today, I am attempting to create an OS/2 1.0 VM using instructions/samples
from here:

http://www.os2museum.com/wp/?p=2314#more-2314

Following the suggested instructions, once the initial VM is created, a couple
of customizations are required via the shell prompt via the VBoxManage command.

My first sign of trouble was when I attempted to list out my VM's. Again, I
have a dozen VM's, (2) of which are currently running.
.........................................
# VBoxManage list vms
# VBoxManage list --long vms
#
.........................................

Nothing comes back.

No problem, I know the name of my VM, and the specific configuration
modification I need to give is the "--triplefaultreset on" command. So I run
that and get this back.

I try it with, and without quotes around the VM name, based on examples I see in
the VirtualBox documentation PDF.

.........................................

# VBoxManage modifyvm "OS2-1.0" --triplefaultreset on
VBoxManage: error: Could not find a registered machine named 'OS2-1.0'
VBoxManage: error: Details: code VBOX_E_OBJECT_NOT_FOUND (0x80bb0001), component
VirtualBox, interface IVirtualBox, callee nsISupports
VBoxManage: error: Context: "FindMachine(Bstr(a->argv[0]).raw(),
machine.asOutParam())" at line 455 of file VBoxManageModifyVM.cpp

# VBoxManage modifyvm OS2-1.0 --triplefaultreset on
VBoxManage: error: Could not find a registered machine named 'OS2-1.0'
VBoxManage: error: Details: code VBOX_E_OBJECT_NOT_FOUND (0x80bb0001), component
VirtualBox, interface IVirtualBox, callee nsISupports
VBoxManage: error: Context: "FindMachine(Bstr(a->argv[0]).raw(),
machine.asOutParam())" at line 455 of file VBoxManageModifyVM.cpp
#
.........................................

I played around with a couple of additional VBoxManage sub-commands. For
example, I can run "VBoxManage list ostypes", but most either return blank, or
generate a similar error.

any thoughts on this? I am pretty certain my VM name is correct:

.........................................
# ls -1 "VirtualBox VMs"
Fedora18
FreeBSD 10
FreeBSD 9.1
Mountain Lion2 - don't use me - clone me
Mountain Lion3
NAS4free
OS2-1.0
Solaris 11.1 - dont use me
Solaris 11.1 cacti
tribblix milestone 6
windows7 - dont use me
windows7 - FS IP
windows7 - Glow
windows7-Cisco
windows7-grace
windows7-home
#
.........................................

[Gregory Nowak]

Post by Jerry Kemp
I am running VirtualBox 4.3.6 using OpenIndiana as a host system.
.........................................
# uname -a
SunOS u20m3 5.11 oi_151a7 i86pc i386 i86pc
.........................................
I have a dozen different VM's installed/configured thru the VirtualBox GUI, and
they all work great.
So today, I am attempting to create an OS/2 1.0 VM using instructions/samples
http://www.os2museum.com/wp/?p=2314#more-2314
Following the suggested instructions, once the initial VM is created, a couple
of customizations are required via the shell prompt via the VBoxManage command.
My first sign of trouble was when I attempted to list out my VM's. Again, I
have a dozen VM's, (2) of which are currently running.
.........................................
# VBoxManage list vms
# VBoxManage list --long vms
#
.........................................
Nothing comes back.
No problem, I know the name of my VM, and the specific configuration
modification I need to give is the "--triplefaultreset on" command. So I run
that and get this back.
I try it with, and without quotes around the VM name, based on examples I see in
the VirtualBox documentation PDF.
.........................................
# VBoxManage modifyvm "OS2-1.0" --triplefaultreset on
VBoxManage: error: Could not find a registered machine named 'OS2-1.0'
VBoxManage: error: Details: code VBOX_E_OBJECT_NOT_FOUND (0x80bb0001), component
VirtualBox, interface IVirtualBox, callee nsISupports
VBoxManage: error: Context: "FindMachine(Bstr(a->argv[0]).raw(),
machine.asOutParam())" at line 455 of file VBoxManageModifyVM.cpp
# VBoxManage modifyvm OS2-1.0 --triplefaultreset on
VBoxManage: error: Could not find a registered machine named 'OS2-1.0'
VBoxManage: error: Details: code VBOX_E_OBJECT_NOT_FOUND (0x80bb0001), component
VirtualBox, interface IVirtualBox, callee nsISupports
VBoxManage: error: Context: "FindMachine(Bstr(a->argv[0]).raw(),
machine.asOutParam())" at line 455 of file VBoxManageModifyVM.cpp
#
.........................................
I played around with a couple of additional VBoxManage sub-commands. For
example, I can run "VBoxManage list ostypes", but most either return blank, or
generate a similar error.

You are running vboxmanage as the same user running the guests,
correct?

Greg

[Jerry Kemp]

Thank you Greg.

You nailed it.

I had done everything else correctly, running as my standard UID.

I was (trying) to execute VBoxManage as root.

OS/2 1.0 is installing now.

Thanks again,

Jerry

Post by Gregory Nowak
You are running vboxmanage as the same user running the guests,
correct?
Greg

[Fernando Cassia]

Post by Jerry Kemp
I was (trying) to execute VBoxManage as root.

hey Frank & the rest of devs, don't you think the error message is a bit
obscure? a failure in some .cpp source code line?
How about plain English? "You cannot run vboxmanage as administrator".

;)

FC

[Michael Thayer]

Hello Fernando,

Post by Jerry Kemp
I was (trying) to execute VBoxManage as root.
hey Frank & the rest of devs, don't you think the error message is a bit
obscure? a failure in some .cpp source code line?
How about plain English? "You cannot run vboxmanage as administrator".
;)

Not quite sure how to answer here. First, you can run VBoxManage as
administrator, but it will then only work with machines created by the
administrator. Simply each user, including root, has their own set of
machines, and VBoxManage will find the machines for the user it is run
as. Regarding the error, I agree it is a bit messy. On the one hand
VBoxManage is meant as an advanced user tool (and the first line of the
message contains "plain language" information about the error), on the
other I'm not sure if the rest of the information really helps anyone.
Perhaps a blank line before the "details" bit would help...

Regards,

Michael
--
ORACLE Deutschland B.V. & Co. KG Michael Thayer
Werkstrasse 24 VirtualBox engineering
71384 Weinstadt, Germany mailto:michael.thayer-QHcLZuEGTsvQT0dZR+***@public.gmane.org

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[Fernando Cassia]

On Thu, Apr 24, 2014 at 4:19 AM, Michael Thayer

On the one hand VBoxManage is meant as an advanced user tool (and the
first line of the message contains "plain language" information about the
error), on the other I'm not sure if the rest of the information really
helps anyone. Perhaps a blank line before the "details" bit would help...

Hi Michael,

Thanks for the reply. About your response "you can run VBoxManage as root"
perhaps I'm thinking of Linux, where using programs as root is heavily
discouraged. Programs like VLC refuse to run as root, and many distros do
NOT allow you to log-in to the graphical desktop with your root credentials
by default.
http://smegnl.medina.oh.us/index.php/figured-it-out/71-enable-root-login-to-gui-in-fedora

http://www.howtogeek.com/124950/htg-explains-why-you-shouldnt-log-into-your-linux-system-as-root/

Of course you can 'su' from bash or 'sudo' to run programs as root, but
normally I execute virtualbox from my main account, which is NOT root.

Thinking aloud, perhaps running VBOXmanage as root should not fail, but
instead display a warning message telling users about the fact, so if they
were at a bash prompt and did 'su' before to run some other command but
then continue running vboxmanage as root as a mistake, they're quickly
aware of the fact?.

Option B: how about a middle-ground solution?. The messy details could be
saved to a file, and the error message could simply read "Details have been
saved to the file error[xx].log" Or appended to the system's error log if
invoked from another process (ie, non-interactively).

I think that the fact that a given program is a command line tool doesn't
exempt it from user-friendly messages. Digital Research's DR-DOS 6.0 had a
nice advantage over MS-DOS, it's human-friendly documentation of switches,
including examples of usage, invoked by appending /? to any given command.
I remember DR-DOS in high regard because of this.

Sorry for the long reply. Hope I've made my point clearer.
FC

[Gregory Nowak]

Post by Fernando Cassia
Thanks for the reply. About your response "you can run VBoxManage as root"
perhaps I'm thinking of Linux, where using programs as root is heavily
discouraged. Programs like VLC refuse to run as root, and many distros do
NOT allow you to log-in to the graphical desktop with your root credentials
by default.
http://smegnl.medina.oh.us/index.php/figured-it-out/71-enable-root-login-to-gui-in-fedora
http://www.howtogeek.com/124950/htg-explains-why-you-shouldnt-log-into-your-linux-system-as-root/
Of course you can 'su' from bash or 'sudo' to run programs as root, but
normally I execute virtualbox from my main account, which is NOT root.

I have to jump in here again. Just because running programs as root is
discouraged under GNU/Linux doesn't mean it should be prohibited. We
aren't talking about M$ windows after all.

Post by Fernando Cassia
Thinking aloud, perhaps running VBOXmanage as root should not fail, but
instead display a warning message telling users about the fact, so if they
were at a bash prompt and did 'su' before to run some other command but
then continue running vboxmanage as root as a mistake, they're quickly
aware of the fact?.

That sounds fine. However, some people may want to run a guest as
root, on a live CD for example.

Greg

[Fernando Cassia]

Post by Gregory Nowak
That sounds fine. However, some people may want to run a guest as
root, on a live CD for example.

We're not talking about guests here. I think we're talking about running
vboxmanage AS ROOT on the HOST.

Or did I miss something?

FC

[Gregory Nowak]

Post by Fernando Cassia
We're not talking about guests here. I think we're talking about running
vboxmanage AS ROOT on the HOST.

Exactly, but if you run a guest as root, you will also want to be able
to run vboxmanage as root to interact with that particular guest.

Greg

[Fernando Cassia]

Post by Jerry Kemp
" at line 455 of file VBoxManageModifyVM.cpp

Hi Jerry,

By doing a google search on the above error, I was able to find this old thread.
https://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=58708

See if anything in that discussion helps you. Particularly the bits
about not calling vboxmanage as root.

I'm shooting in the dark here as I don't run Solaris/OpenIndiana as
host nor do I use vboxmanage much.

But I didn't want to go to bed without at least trying to help
somehow. Perhaps others who do run Solaris as host can comment
further.

Good luck!
FC
--
During times of Universal Deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act
Durante épocas de Engaño Universal, decir la verdad se convierte en un
Acto Revolucionario
- George Orwell

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