CentOS 6.4 on VBox 4.2 on Windows 7... no network connection

[Orthoducks]

I'm trying to install the following items on my Windows 7 computer:

1. Oracle VM VirtualBox v4.2.16.

2. The "software development workstation" installation package for CentOS v6.4.

The object is to create a platform for evaluating some web applications that are designed to install only under Linux.

So far I've successfully installed VirtualBox and CentOS, but CentOS has no network connections. I understand that it should automatically detect the attached network and configure itself accordingly. Evidently that's not happening.

There's no doubt that the network is available; if Windows 7 didn't have access to it, I wouldn't have been able to install anything at all (or post this message).

Can anyone please help me figure out why CentOS doesn't detect the network, and fix it?

[mpack]

I understand that it should automatically detect the attached network and configure itself accordingly

Uh, why do you understand that? It's a VM, it doesn't automatically use anything that belongs to the host. If you configure the VM for NAT mode (VM settings | Network) then the guest should be able to access the internet via the host, assuming of course that your host has it. Apologies if you already tried using NAT, but you didn't mention doing it.

[Orthoducks-bis]

This is Orthoducks again, logging in from a new account because the forum has locked me out of my old one.

I tried to post a response describing what has happened since my last post, by the forum responds "You must be a member for 1 days and have 1 posts before you can post urls." My response contains no URLs, and I can't figure out what the forum is mistaking for one, so I'm posting this message so that I'll have "1 posts" and presumably be able to respond to your advice tomorrow.

Meanwhile, I wonder if you can help me regain control of my original account.

After the forum refused to let me log in with my customary forum password, I clicked the "forgot password" link. The site said it would send me email, but none ever arrived.

When I created this new account the forum would not let me use my business email address, saying it was already in use, so I know I entered the address correctly when I defined the original account.

I tried logging in with every password I could think of, on the chance that I defined the account with something other than my usual forum password. Finally the forum locked me out and told me to "contact the system administrator," but I can't find any such link on the site.

[mpack]

Meanwhile, I wonder if you can help me regain control of my original account.

I'm afraid not. The moderators here are volunteer users, not system admins.

[Orthoducks-bis]

Regarding the user account problem, is there a way to reach a sysadmin? As I said, the site appears to assume that sysadmins will handle problems like this, but I can't find any link that will get the attention of one.

Regarding the network access problem, I was able to solve it by reinstalling Linux and selecting "auto connect" in the "Configure Network" dialog. I had to delete the old VM's files manually, but that worked nicely. Thank you for your help.

[mpack]

If you click on the The team link near the bottom of the any web page then you should see some sysadmin links in red.