One of the great things about going to a public web forum for technical help
is that the answers to your questions are out there for anyone else
encountering a similar problem. Trying to run VirtualBox under Trisquel 7
was the trigger for the problem that is the raison d'être of this thread.
For the sake of other users who find this thread when searching for help, I
should point out that VirtualBox simply may not work under Trisquel 7,
because recent versions of VirtualBox are not libre software.
The issue with VirtualBox is the license for one of the requirements to build
it from source--the Open Watcom compiler--which is an edge case of a license
that is open-source (per OSI) but not free-as-in-libre (per GNU/FSF). I
thought it would be remiss if I let this thread die without acknowledging
that fact...especially because I wish I had looked up the relevant
documentation before I tried to use VirtualBox with Trisquel 7.
It's a shame. VirtualBox has a VERY nice interface. But I've found qemu to
be a more-than-adequate replacement.
