VirtualBox 5.1.x loses mouse capture in guest (mouse clicks no longer work in host too) -> duplicate of #16562

[halfer]

This ticket is a write-up of ​this forum post. It relates to 5.1.22 but I have had identical problems with earlier incarnations of 5.1.x as well. My belief is that this problem came with the 5.1.0 major version bump, since 5.0 did not suffer from this bug.

My host is Linux Mint 16 Cinnamon, and my Linux guests are Ubuntu 14.04 or Mint 17 Mate.

What happens is the mouse capture from the guest stops working, and I cannot click on anything in the guest. The keyboard still works, and the guest is still running. I can minimise the full-screened guest using the Ctrl-Right-M, and I can toggle full-screen using Ctrl-Right-F. Unfortunately VB is still hanging onto the capture, so if I do minimise the window, I cannot click on anything in the host either.

I have to use Alt-Tab, Alt-Esc and keyboard shortcuts to use either the host or the guest. If am lucky enough to be able to get the right keyboard shortcuts to get back into the guest, restarting the machine using sudo shutdown -r now does not alleviate the situation, but sudo shutdown now helps, and everything is back to normal, and I can then restart the guest.

I will attach a log file in a separate post.

[halfer]

Zipped log file from log GUI after machine shutdown

[halfer]

The attached log file may be useful in tracking down the problem. I do not resize the display manually, since it is always full-screen. The logs will show that the guest is SUSPENDING/SUSPENDED - that is in fact my putting the host to sleep, and then unsleeping. That may be relevant, but it has never happened immediately after such an event - it is always a seemingly random when the guest is actually in use.

There are some events after 00:44:42.252715 that are interesting - six resize events. I run a 3x3 workspace grid, if that is helpful, though since the problem exhibits on two separate OS guests I suppose it is unlikely to be a factor.

I have used most releases of 5.0 for several years, and I don't recall getting this problem, but I get it once or twice a day with 5.1. I am sure that if I go back to 5.0 the problem will go away.

Please let me know if you need anything else!

[Michael Thayer]

Could this be a duplicate of #16562? I have a suspicion that that is an X.Org issue. See the debugging instructions there.

[halfer]

Ah, thanks Michael. That sounds so similar I would be inclined to agree, and would be happy for this to close if you wish (I do not have the ability to do so). I did a thorough search prior to asking, but managed to miss this one!

It is interesting that the OP reckons they can replicate on a later version of 5.0.x. That series has been great for me, up to 5.0.40, and I tend to update minor version bumps quite frequently. However I may have just been lucky.