ost-only network adapters settings change after reinstall

[Nazgulled]

Every time I reinstall (mostly when updating to a new version) VirtualBox, my host-only network adapter settings are changed... I found out about this when the internet in the guests stopped working. The first time it took me a while to discover that the problem was on the changed settings, I never though they would be different for any reason.

The host-only settings for each adapter has two tabs, "Adapter" and "DHCP Server".

Since I have the DHCP Server disabled, I don't know if it happens to those settings. But for the Adapter, I change the IP and Network Mask to match my needs and every time I update (last time was 3.0.2 -> 3.0.4), those settings are reset to the default values and because of that, my network connection stops working in the guests because it can't find the Adapter IP I specified.

Don't you agree that any settings for custom configurations shouldn't be changed when the user re-installs or upgrades to a new version? I mean, I changed the settings for a reason, I'm not expecting them to change unless I explicitly change them.

[Norman Henderson]

I confirm this, specifically:

• when upgrading to 4.1.0r30079, the network settings on the host system (Win Server 2008 R2 Enterprise) for the Virtualbox Host-Only Adapter morphed from a static address and mask to "use DHCP". This was a few months ago.

• when upgrading to 4.1.4r74291 today, exactly the same thing happened. It is annoying to have to redo the network settings on the host machine at every upgrade.

It's astounding that this bug report received no action in two years?!!

[Frank Mehnert]

Is it? So where is your patch to fix this bug? Please be aware that we can only provide best-effort support. Some bugs are more important than others and the VBox developer team decides what to fix first. Contributions from the community may speed up things.

[Norman Henderson]

Frank- there's no need to get annoyed with me and all. Perhaps I was expecting too much from Oracle Corp.

I am a systems manager, not a developer and you wouldn't want my patch - I haven't written code for over 30 years.

Suggestion: since the system is pretty proactive about telling us when there is a new release and encouraging us to upgrade, It would help the communitiy if there were a warning somewhere (maybe there is and I missed it) that network settings might change inadvertently.

As to the two years without any response on this bug, in the time you spent flaming at me you could have (preferably 2 years ago) lowered the priority from "major" and added a note saying how much you really would like to fix it, but since there is a workaround it's low priority and you won't be getting to it for quite a while.

[Frank Mehnert]

You misunderstood me, that was not a flame. If you look at all the other bugs you will find out that many other bugs are open as well. And I think the current priority is correct: this is a major issue (but not critical nor a blocker). This bug is indeed annoying but there are other bugs as well.

Actually AFAIR there should be a warning when you upgrade VirtualBox on Windows shown by the Installer that all host interfaces will be removed. Did you see this warning?

[Michael Thayer]

Replying to nghenderson:

Frank- there's no need to get annoyed with me and all. Perhaps I was expecting too much from Oracle Corp.

Sorry to be butting in, but do you realise that your previous comment sounded somewhat inflammatory? Frank's answer may have been slightly annoyed, but I thought the content was both correct and reasonable.

[Norman Henderson]

I remember seeing a warning along the lines that network interfaces? connections? will be disconnected - perhaps it's a case of ambiguous wording: I interpreted the warning to mean that there would be a momentary interruption of network services, not that the network interface settings on the host would change (because it gets removed and recreated, if that is indeed what happens).