[Solved] Bi-directional copy-paste doesn't work Guest to Host

[vboxuser799]

Problem: copy-paste from Host to Guest works. Does not work the other way. Copy-paste used to work just fine both ways, but two things have changed: (1) I went from and older version of VB (5.1.x) to 5.2.4. (2) I replaced the .vdi file to roll-back to a backup I had.

Details:
VirtualBox 5.2.4 r119785
Host: Mac OS 10.10.5 Yosemite
Guest: Windows 10 Version 1703 (OS Build 15063.726)
Best I can tell, Guest Additions is installed, but maybe not: The menu item "Devices > Insert Guest Additions CD image" is not grayed-out (I think it's supposed to be grayed out when the GA image is installed; am I mistaken?).
Log is uploaded here:

VBox copy.log

VBox log file

(89.54 KiB) Downloaded 226 times

I have shut down both host and guest and restarted.

I have searched for the virtualbox.org forums, and I found some stuff about copy-paste, but it seems those issues either not on Mac hosts with Windows guests, or the copy-paste did not work at all. I also found this old tutorial (https://www.wintips.org/how-to-fix-orac ... d-windows/) and did what it said to do to make sure vboxtray.exe is working, and I think I did it right (it's from maybe Win7, so some steps were slightly different for my Windows 10).

Any help you can offer would be appreciated.

[vboxuser799]

I just realized that I can hover over the icon at the bottom right of the guest and see what version of Guest Additions is installed. This may be the problem: it says that it's 5.1.22r115126, but I'm using the VB v. 5.2.4.

How can I get the right version of GA installed?

[socratis]

I think it's supposed to be grayed out when the GA image is installed; am I mistaken?

1) No. The installation of the GAs and what you have on your virtual CD are unrelated. 2) I'm afraid that you are indeed mistaken

How can I get the right version of GA installed?

Inserting the CD does just that; inserts the CD, nothing more. You need to actually install the GAs. Take a look in the User's Manual, Ch. 4.2.1. Guest Additions for Windows. That should give you step-by-step instructions. Be sure to remove/eject the GAs CD once you're done with the installation.

[mpack]

Please do not reference offsite blogs. The only authorities recognized here are the devs, the user manual, and the tutorials which are actively maintained on this site. We do not offer any maintenance of offsite blogs from random bloggers.

One of the references I just mentioned is the user manual. Chapter 4.2 has excellent advice on how to install the Guest Additions, so that might be a place to start.

[vboxuser799]

Thank you, mpack and socratis.

Good news: I now have the correct version of GAs running. I had actually read some of that stuff in the manual, but not being much of a computer geek, I didn't understand a lot of it. It was unclear to me that I had to go find the mounted E:\ drive and then click on the "VBoxWindowsAdditions.exe" file. And I'm glad you said to eject the .iso disk afterwards, since I would not have done that.

Apology: And sorry, mpack, for the link to other documentation (i.e., off-site blogs). I thought it was relevant info. I will try to remember next time what to / not to say.

Bad news: I still can only copy Host to Guest with the clipboard. Guest to host doesn't work. Any clues on what to do next?

[mpack]

What type of data are you copy/pasting - e.g. what is the app in the guest?

[vboxuser799]

Your question made me try several things, and I think I've concluded the problem is not related to VirtualBox. I tried copy-paste with several apps on both OSes. Thank you!

Copying simple text from a Word processor (Nisus or LibreOffice) on the Mac (host) side:

To: Notepad on Win10 = success (I can paste from Host to the Guest's Notepad)
To: Word on Win10 = success (I can paste Host to Guest's WORD)

Copying simple text from a Word processor (WORD or Notepad) on the Win10 (guest) side:

To: NisusWriter Pro on Mac OS = success (I can paste from Guest to Host's NWP)
To: LibreOffice on Mac OS = success (I can paste from Guest to Host's LibreOffice)

My problem was that I was using another program (SwordSearcher) on the Guest, and it won't paste directly to the Mac side. It used to, however. I had just re-installed that software, and after I did I lost the ability to directly copy-paste from SwordSearcher to NisusWriter Pro or LibreOffice on the Mac side. After research, I discovered that some things copied from SwordSearcher will paste directly and some won't (but all them copy-paste within Windows with no problem!).

So I think the case is closed as far as VB is concerned. The only issue now is with the developer of SwordSearcher.

Thanks again!

[mpack]

Thanks for reporting back.

The most likely reason for Copy-Paste failures in that scenario, other than straight up bugs, is that the application is using OLE to render just in time, depending on what the target app wants. However this doesn't always work well when the target app is on another PC.

[vboxuser799]

The SwordSearcher app developer said this: "… the target application doesn't like the HTML on the clipboard". I switched his app to "Force plain-text clipboard mode" and now it works, albeit only with plain text, of course.

Thanks again!

[mpack]

Good, I'll mark the topic solved.