Shared folders from Windows 8.1 host "stuck" and "empty" on OpenSUSE 13.1 Client (VirtualBox)

[wolfi323]

@tsu2

I discovered
1. Installing VBox Guest Additions from an Oracle Download

Although the community version of Virtualbox additions are automatically installed when the openSUSE install detects it’s being installed as a VB Guest, the community version is missing features, perhaps most importantly the ability to create and use snapshots. The following instructions assumes you downloaded and installed Vbox from the Oracle website and are not using the openSUSE repos.

a. Following the VBox additions “best practices” I first uninstalled the two packages that constitute the installed VBox additions. I believe the OP in this thread skipped this recommended step

zipper rm virtualbox-guest-tools virtualbox-guest-x11

b. Pointed the CDROM device to the file “VBoxGuestAdditions.iso” which is located wherever you extracted the file you downloaded from Oracle.

c. Installed make, gcc and kernel source which are prerequisites for building Guest Additions in your Guest.
Note that the kernel source package name should be modified for the kernel you have installed which might typically be desktop, default, vanilla.

zipper in make gcc kernel-desktop-devel

d. Using either a file manager or CLI, browse to the CDROM and execute

autorun.sh

The above steps should run, resulting in all SUCCESSFUL steps. If any result in FAILED, follow the instructions displayed to inspect the log to determine the cause.

Again:
This is not necessary.
Just update the virtualbox-guest-tools package to the latest version from the update repo.

The 4.2.18 version had this bug, but it has been fixed in the openSUSE package. Unfortunately the fix didn’t make it into 13.1 final, but it is in the update repo already.
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=841673

[tsu2]

@wolfi323

Again:
This is not necessary.
Just update the virtualbox-guest-tools package to the latest version from the update repo.

The 4.2.18 version had this bug, but it has been fixed in the openSUSE package. Unfortunately the fix didn’t make it into 13.1 final, but it is in the update repo already.
Access Denied

As I posted near the top of my post,
My post applies to those who install VBox from Oracle and not from the OSS repos.

Are you saying that the Update Repo will update an installation created by download from Oracle?

As an aside, since the Oracle download was <very recent> as of this writing, I’d find it remarkable that the update was available in the Update repo before Oracle even has released.

TSU

[wolfi323]

@tsu2

As I posted near the top of my post,
My post applies to those who install VBox from Oracle and not from the OSS repos.

Are you saying that the Update Repo will update an installation created by download from Oracle?

It doesn’t matter where you installed VirtualBox from.
This is about the guest.
And openSUSE includes and installs the guest tools packages automatically when you install it as guest in VirtualBox.

If you do want to install the guest tools from the Oracle site, you should uninstall the guest tools packages first. (as you wrote)
But again, this is not necessary. The versions of the guest tools don’t have to match the VirtualBox version exactly.

As an aside, since the Oracle download was <very recent> as of this writing, I’d find it remarkable that the update was available in the Update repo before Oracle even has released.

Well, it was me who pushed this update…
But what you say is not quite true. The update repo contains virtualbox 4.2.18 with this fix (this problem is specific to 4.2.18).
The Oracle download is version 4.3.2 already, they fixed this problem with 4.3.0 and that was release before openSUSE 13.1, on October 15th.