Cannot disable update reminders - GUI missing, command line ignored

[qazwsxedc]

Virtualbox 5.0.18_Debian r106667 on Debian Jessie, MATE desktop.

Reminders to update the guest additions keep popping up in the guests. I have set

Code: Select all

VBoxManage setextradata global GUI/UpdateDate never

but that doesn't suppress the reminders.

Contrary to what the docs say, the File - Preferences dialog box of the VirtualBox Manager GUI no longer contains an "update" item in the list on the left of the dialog box.

Is there another way to suppress these update reminders from the command line, or is there some magic required to get the "update" item back in the GUI?

[Perryg]

Mine does. Where do you get your install from? Post a guests log file ( as an attachment )

[socratis]

You seem to be confusing the "Update Guest Additions" inside your guest with "Update VirtualBox" in your host. Which one is it?

[qazwsxedc]

@Perryg: From the Debian repositories and from download[dot]virtualbox[dot]org as follows:

virtualbox package is from jessie-backports
virtualbox-guest-additions-iso is from stretch (there is no virtualbox-guest-additions-iso in jessie-backports, and the virtualbox package was backported from stretch)
Extension pack is from download[dot]virtualbox[dot]org

I know that the VirtualBox version is 5.0.18, and the guest additions are 5.0.16. The issue isn't that the guest extension may need updating. The issue *IS* that VirtualBox goes and looks for an update when I don't want it to do that, and I can't find a way to stop it. Guest log attached. Screen shot of preferences dialog attached also, the "Update" item is definitely missing.

@socratis: It's "Update guest additions" I'm concerned about.

Apologies for the mangling with [dot] above, the forum software doesn't let me as a newbie post any URLs.

[Perryg]

This might explain why the update icon is missing. You are running the Debian fork and not the official release. If you want all the features you need to purge the Debian fork and install the one from virtualbox.org. Your guest/s will remain.

That said this will have nothing to do with announcing that you need to update the guest additions as socratis mentioned. It is for the update of the main program.

[socratis]

You should definitely do as Perry said for the VirtualBox program itself. As far as the "Update guest additions" message inside the guests, there's nothing you can do about it AFAIK.

The only solution I can see is to install the official 5.0.16 from virtualbox.org and disable the update checks for the program itself. Although I have to admit that it eludes me why 1) you wouldn't want to update the guest additions, or even better, 2) why does it bother you so much for a simple message in the guest.

[qazwsxedc]

@Perryg, @socratis

Thank you for your quick replies.

Thinking about it, it's quite possible that the "Update" option in the preferences dialog is disabled in the Debian fork because the Debian maintainers don't want binary updates to be pulled in from anywhere except repos the user has explicitly configured themselves in /etc/apt/sources.list . Which from their (and my) perspective makes sense. So that really is a documentation bug.

Briefly answering socratis's points:
1) 5.0.16 is not broken for my use cases, so I don't want to fix it.
2) Because it indicates that the guest additions, without my knowledge and consent, and without me being able to easily suppress this behaviour, phone home to check. This is problematic because it leaks metadata about each user, their location and so on. It also increases the attack surface of each VM. I'll raise a bug for the Debian fork about this. In the meantime I'll have to work around it with tcpdump and firewall policy.

These really are philosophical points about ownership. (Which given your user name, is apt.) In the end, it comes down to a single question: Who do you want to have control over a computer's behaviour, the user or the software maker?

[Perryg]

Also as long as you are using the Debian fork you will need to ask them for support. As for documentation it only would be incorrect if the feature had not been removed by the maintainer of the fork so no it is not a bug.

[socratis]

the guest additions, without my knowledge and consent, and without me being able to easily suppress this behaviour, phone home to check

You are 100% mistaken here. It does not phone home. It checks the VirtualBox version that launched the VM, checks the guest additions version and if there is a difference, it notifies you. No need for conspiracy theories. No big brother is tracking you down.

Read again the sentence before these two questions:

The only solution I can see is to install the official 5.0.16 from virtualbox.org and disable the update checks for the program itself.