virtualbox.org

When running in full-screen mode, and the mouse is moved to the top of the screen, a menu bar drops down and covers the top of my work area.

For example. You try to click on a browser tab but instead the menu bar just drops itself right overtop and you end up clicking on the menu instead. This makes Virtualbox at the very least, annoying, at the most unusable for any serious work flow.

I have found posts complaining of this issue 5 years old. I cannot comprehend how or why something this simple, and this annoying, would not have been corrected by now.

Details..

VirtualBox version 4.3.2
Host Machine MAC Book with OSX 10.8.5
Guest OS Windows 7


When I open VirtualBox > Preferences > General ..
uncheck the box.. Dock and Menubar (auto show in full screen)
Restart Virtual Box

Nothing happens. The top menu bar continues to show in full screen when the mouse is moved to the top.

The Dock has been addressed several times but when apple decides to change things it gets broken again. There is not a lot that anyone but apple can make a permanent fix for this issue IMHO.

Perryg wrote:The Dock has been addressed several times but when apple decides to change things it gets broken again. There is not a lot that anyone but apple can make a permanent fix for this issue IMHO.

I think this is the first time I've disagreed with something Perryg has said. I don't believe it is up to Apple to "permanently fix" VirtualBox. Software that runs on a particular platform often breaks with changes to the OS and it's up to the developers to rewrite their software to work with those changes. I would also point out that "Always Hide" the menu bar does work with at least one commercial hypervisor for Macs. I don't know when VirtualBox removed the preference to hide the menu bar but it's no longer available in 4.3.21. Perhaps Oracle/VirtualBox got tired of chasing the changes to OSX.

FWIW, I happen to find it convenient to have the Mac's menu bar show by moving the cursor to the top of the screen.

I may have not made my point clear. I believe the issue is the always changing code of the host was the reason why it breaks. Then the DEVs would re-write the code to fix it but it gets changed again. So my point is why is that part of the host code always changing and why can't it be fixed on the host side to not change. Changes like this do not make it to the top of the fix list because it is annoying but not a show stopper which makes it almost always broken between host versions and VBox versions. Of course if someone wanted to keep the code updated and contribute it to the VBox team I know a lot of people that would be appreciative.

As far as why Apple changes their code I can't answer that. I'm sure they have their reasons. I do know it drives some developers of software for Apple a bit nuts.

Perryg wrote:I may have not made my point clear. I believe the issue is the always changing code of the host was the reason why it breaks.

Perryg, I definitely agree but on first reading of your post it wasn't how I interpreted it. And you are correct, unless Apple decided to freeze the code, third party apps such as VirtualBox will have to chase the changes in Apple's code. It's certainly not VirtualBox's fault.

I guess I didn't disagree with you after all. Maybe next time.