Hello.
I am a new member of this list, and a new user of virtualbox. I would
like to start off by saying thank you to Innotek for making a product
of such high quality available to home users for free, and without
requiring one to all but give away one's I.D. info in order to get a
license number to use the product.
My main reason for posting is a problem I'm running into when
attempting to use the serial port feature newly added in the latest
version. I am running on a windows xp professional host, and this
problem seems to be happening regardless of the guest operating system
used. I configured the serial port according to the user's manual as
follows:
VBoxManage setextradata debian "VBoxInternal/Devices/serial/0/Config/IRQ" 4
VBoxManage setextradata debian "VBoxInternal/Devices/serial/0/Config/IOBase"
0x3f8
VBoxManage setextradata debian "VBoxInternal/Devices/serial/0/LUN#0/Driver" Char
VBoxManage setextradata debian
"VBoxInternal/Devices/serial/0/LUN#0/AttachedDriver/Driver" NamedPipe
VBoxManage setextradata debian
"VBoxInternal/Devices/serial/0/LUN#0/AttachedDriver/Config/Location"
"\\.\pipe\vmwaredebug"
VBoxManage setextradata debian
"VBoxInternal/Devices/serial/0/LUN#0/AttachedDriver/Config/IsClient"
Vboxmanage returns no errors after each invocation, and using
getextradata confirms that everything is configured as expected. I am
using the vmwaregateway application mentioned in the manual, and am
attempting to connect virtualbox to the vmwaredebug namedpipe as a
client, that vmwaregateway provides. I have vmwaregateway running in
test mode (with the /T flag) before I start the debian vm. Once I
start the vm, it doesn't power on, and virtualbox displays an error
saying that serial0 cannot attach to char driver. Below are the
relevant portions of vbox.log for this session:
00:00:02.267 [/Devices/serial/] (level 2)
00:00:02.267
00:00:02.267 [/Devices/serial/0/] (level 3)
00:00:02.267
00:00:02.267 [/Devices/serial/0/Config/] (level 4)
00:00:02.267 IRQ <integer> = 0x0000000000000004 (4)
00:00:02.267 IOBase <integer> = 0x00000000000003f8 (1016)
00:00:02.267
00:00:02.267 [/Devices/serial/0/LUN#0/] (level 4)
00:00:02.267 Driver <string> = "Char" (cch=5)
00:00:02.267
00:00:02.267 [/Devices/serial/0/LUN#0/AttachedDriver/] (level 5)
00:00:02.267 Driver <string> = "NamedPipe" (cch=10)
00:00:02.267
00:00:02.267 [/Devices/serial/0/LUN#0/AttachedDriver/Config/] (level
6)
00:00:02.267 Location <string> = "\\.\pipe\vmwaredebug" (cch=21)
00:00:02.267
-----
00:00:02.715 ERROR [COM]: aRC=0x80004005
aIID={1dea5c4b-0753-4193-b909-22330f64ec45} aComponent={Console}
aText={Char#0 failed to attach driver below.
00:00:02.715 VBox status code: -2103 (VERR_CFGM_VALUE_NOT_FOUND)}
aPreserve=false
00:00:02.715 ERROR [COM]: aRC=0x80004005
aIID={1dea5c4b-0753-4193-b909-22330f64ec45} aComponent={Console}
aText={Serial device 0 cannot attach to char driver
00:00:02.715 .
00:00:02.715 VBox status code: -2103 (VERR_CFGM_VALUE_NOT_FOUND)}
aPreserve=false
00:00:02.833 Power up failed (vrc=VERR_CFGM_VALUE_NOT_FOUND,
hrc=0x80004005)
00:00:03.018 ERROR [COM]: aRC=0x80070005
aIID={fd443ec1-000a-4f5b-9282-d72760a66916} aComponent={Keyboard}
aText={The console is not powered up} aPreserve=false
00:00:21.648 ERROR [COM]: aRC=0x80070005
aIID={fd443ec1-000a-4f5b-9282-d72760a66916} aComponent={Keyboard}
aText={The console is not powered up} aPreserve=false
00:00:21.811 ERROR [COM]: aRC=0x80070005
aIID={fd443ec1-000a-4f5b-9282-d72760a66916} aComponent={Keyboard}
aText={The console is not powered up} aPreserve=false
I didn't think it would be appropriate to post the whole log file to
the list. So, if someone from innotek would like me to send the
complete log file to them privately, or if it is ok to post the whole
log to the list, please let me know. Is there something I'm doing
wrong here, or is this a bug which will be fixed in a future release?
Like my subject says, I have a few suggestions for improvement as
well:
1. Could innotek please consider either implementing the gui interface
to virtualbox as standard windows controls, or exposing components of
the current gui through Microsoft Active Accessibility, so as to make
the gui usable by people such as myself, who access windows using a
screen reader? The screen reader I personally use is called
window-eyes <http://www.gwmicro.com/Window-Eyes>.> I've been able to
make the current gui slightly usable with window-eyes, by tricking it
into thinking the gui custom control is really an mdi window, but
this approach still leaves much to be desired, especially since the
whole gui uses the same class and window style for all controls, thus
making it impossible for the end-user to try to trick window-eyes into
distinguishing the individual controls in the gui interface.
Gw-Micro has some tips for developers wishing to make their products
usable with screen readers at <http://www.gwmicro.com/Developers/>,
and they are willing to help companies make their products
accessible.
I have been using computers since the days of DOS, and use gnu/linux
via the text console exclusively (more on this in my second suggestion
below), so I don't mind using the vboxmanage command-line interface,
but there are a couple of things that don't seem to be doable via
vboxmanage, such as changing the host key from the right control key to
another key, or combination of keys, and it would be nice to have the
option of using the gui interface as well.
2. For my second suggestion, I would like to add my voice to those
asking for access to physical host serial rs232 ports from the virtual
machine. Even if it would be impossible to make this work for all
applications, it would be better to have the feature there, so that it
is usable by those who can use it, than for the feature not to be
there at all. I interact with the gnu/linux text console using a
screen reader called speakup, <http://www.linux-speakup.org>. As of
now, speakup only works with serial-based speech synthesizers, since
the manufacturers of usb speech hardware require a non-disclosure
agreement to be signed, in order to give out specifications for
communicating with their hardware. The way that speakup works
currently, is to probe standard i/o addresses for ttyS0 through ttyS3,
and "steal" the serial port from the linux kernel, if it finds a
synthesizer attached. This means that speakup currently doesn't work
with usb to serial converters, even if these converters use the
generic serial protocol, as opposed to a proprietary protocol.
What I'm getting at here, is that in order to independently install a
gnu/linux distribution which includes speakup as a guest inside
virtualbox, I would need to have access to a physical host serial port
from inside the virtual machine. It's ok if that port is a usb to
serial converter, as long as it is presented to the guest inside the
vm as a standard serial port. It is true that gnu/linux distributions
can be installed via telnet/ssh, however, this isn't true for all
distributions, notably for slackware and debian. It is also possible
to use speakup via software speech using the pc soundcard, however,
the only distribution to support this currently, officially, or
unofficially, is grml. It would also
be possible to do unattended installations of some gnu/linux
distributions, or to have a sighted person read the screen to the
blind person doing the install, however, these aren't ideal solutions.
There have been reports on the speakup list of successful
installations using a serial synthesizer to install a distribution of
gnu/linux with speakup as a guest inside of vmware products, (some of
those were done with a usb to serial converter plugged into the host),
and I
myself have been able to successfully use a dos screen reader with my
serial synthesizer inside of Microsoft virtualpc, and I imagine that speakup
would also work, if I were to try installing a gnu/linux guest inside
of virtualpc. In short, being able to access a physical serial port
from the vm would be a great benefit to many people, including those
who are blind, and who wish to install gnu/linux guests inside of
virtualbox independently, using speakup with a serial speech
synthesizer.
Thanks for reading.
Regards,
Greg
--
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