vbox What is the future of VirtualBox on FreeBSD?

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tennea9

What is the future of VirtualBox on FreeBSD? (as a host)

As a user of VirtualBox, as well as bhyve (in CLI, via BVCP - great latest version by the way... thanks to Davies ! - and also thanks to my own manager,
I am concerned about the future of VirtualBox on FreeBSD.

As of now, the versions available on the quarterly and latest releases are no longer supported, the guest additions can no longer be downloaded, etc.
Last year, it took several months before the package returned to the repositories, due to an issue with electron, and it was necessary to go through a build process to manage to install VirtualBox for quite a while.

What is really going on?

Is there an intention to ever port version 7, or should we expect to have to switch entirely to bhyve?

I am a daily user of bhyve on FreeBSD and illumos, but I find that for now VirtualBox still has significant advantages in terms of ergonomics.
It takes me much more time to manage to create simulations under bhyve than under VirtualBox... and this is quite problematic.
 
tennea9 said:
What is really going on?

Is there an intention to ever port version 7, or should we expect to have to switch entirely to bhyve?
Click to expand...
You should ask the port maintainer vbox@freebsd.org, or on freebsd-emulation@FreeBSD.org. On the latter there is mostly emulation problem reports from https://bugs.freebsd.org CC'd, but when mailed, there should be a reply from a developer.

tennea9 said:
I find that for now VirtualBox still has significant advantages in terms of ergonomics.
It takes me much more time to manage to create simulations under bhyve than under VirtualBox
Click to expand...
I also run simulations in Virtualbox very often before applying on my systems, or to reproduce a forum users problem. The ergonomics to create in VirtualBox a new VM is unmatched in comparison to bhyve(8).

I would hate seeing VirtualBox gone from ports, but I suppose as long as there is source code available (including VBoxGuestAdditions), which is the case back to version 4.0.0, and a maintainer and/or user willing to update the port (even it is only to make sure a unsupported version can be build), then I don't see why it wouldn't stay in ports.
 
tennea9 said:
the guest additions can no longer be downloaded, etc.
Click to expand...

Just a note. This hasn't changed. Guest Additions are closed-source and for a limited number of platforms so have never been available on FreeBSD.

Oops, I meant extension pack... Guest Additions are available.
 
I also use VBox for a minikube instance and to test some OS.
Since it works even if an old version of VBox I don't see any problem with that.
But of course I'd rather getting all product but fix and new features as they are released.
 
kpedersen said:
Guest Additions are closed-source and for a limited number of platforms so have never been available on FreeBSD.
Click to expand...
Surely you mean Extension Packs, Guest Additions are available on FreeBSD:

ports/emulators/virtualbox-ose/Makefile
Code: 
GUESTADDITIONS_DESC=    Build with Guest Additions

ports/emulators/virtualbox-ose/distinfo
Code: 
SHA256 (VBoxGuestAdditions_6.1.50.iso) = ...
SIZE (VBoxGuestAdditions_6.1.50.iso) = ...
 
I too am seriously interested in this discussion, so will now be watching this thread.

It is also a great shame that usb passthrough can't be used in FreeBSD, since this feature requires the unsupported VirtualBox extension pack.
 
bgroper said:
It is also a great shame that usb passthrough can't be used in FreeBSD, since this feature requires the unsupported VirtualBox extension pack.
Click to expand...
As per: https://docs.oracle.com/en/virtualization/virtualbox/6.0/user/usb-support.html
The xHCI and EHCI controllers are shipped as an Oracle VM VirtualBox extension package
Click to expand...
Which means you still have OHCI (usb 1.x) support. In some cases that might be good enough?

VirtualBox 7 (not yet in ports) actually pulls the USB passthrough support into the open-source package (no need for extension pack) which is quite cool.

https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Changelog-7.0
Devices: The EHCI and XHCI USB controller devices are now part of the open source base package
Click to expand...

So it might just be a waiting game...
 
Yes indeed, the waiting game.
I understood the virtualbox extension pack is needed for usb passthrough, even in 7.0.
Seems others too. There's some notes in this blog page.
Maybe we misunderstood. When time permits, I'll try vbox 7.0 usb passthrough on a linux platform.
 
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