Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

Thermopyle · 2012-07-27 22:56:36

I installed Arch as a virtualbox guest on a Win7 machine. The problem I'm encountering is that randomly GNOME or the window manager thinks my mouse is at the top of the screen. The mouse cursor doesn't actually move, but things like these happen:

Move mouse around and all of a sudden the desktop overview comes up because it thinks I hit the hot corner. (I disabled hot corner for now)
Click on things, but various things on the GNOME panel get activated like the date/time or accessiblity options.
Start selecting text in a browser and all of a sudden all the text to the top of the page gets selected.

I installed the virtualbox additions as described in the wiki. I tried toggling the virtual machine option to enable/disable an absolute pointing device, to no avail.

I don't really have any idea how to troubleshoot this.

Hspasta · 2012-07-28 06:40:12

Do you know the steps to reproduce this? By the hot corner, do you mean the notification bar at the bottom? I'm not familiar with the Gnome terms. I'm running Gnome with Win XP virtual machine and I can't reproduce any of the things you've described.

WhiteShadow · 2012-07-31 09:48:31

I have more or less the same problem here.

It's not "phantom clicks" its more "invisible mouse movement" - if you try to move a window with the mouse, the mouse behaves normal, but the window "jumps" from time to time to some weird location. It's independent of the DE. I have it under KDE and xfce. It started about 1 week ago. I am not sure what caused it. Virtual Box upgrade or kernel upgrade.

My shared folder also stopped to automount - "mount.vboxsf ShareMe /media/sf_ShareMe" still works. (solved by changing DAEMON "vbox-service" to "vboxservice")

EDIT:

Host is Win7 64bit
Guest is ArchLinux 64bit

Also tried a fresh ArchLinux installation - same problem

Last edited by WhiteShadow (2012-08-03 06:26:01)

jnever1 · 2012-08-02 21:38:22

To reproduce the problem:
Wiggle the mouse.

Problem description:
Even the most minute of mouse movements results (in my case) an instant Hot-Corner activation. Running Cinnamon DE the effect is worse.

Packages involved:
virtualbox-4.1.18-4-x86_64
virtualbox-linux-modules-4.1.18-4-x86_64
virtualbox-archlinux-additions-4.1.18-4-x86_64
virtualbox-archlinux-modules-4.1.18-4-x86_64
linux-3.4.7-1-x86_64

I am of the opinion that the GuestAdditions are causing the problem this time around. Removing vboxguest from modules in /etc/rc.conf solves the issue. Naturally, it is undesirable to disable either GuestAdditions or the mouse (since it is mouse movement that renders the DE unusable).

For the time being I have settle with Disable Hot-Corner shell exension and/or disabling GuestAdditions.

Last edited by jnever1 (2012-08-02 21:58:58)

ultramancool · 2012-08-06 23:41:31

I'm having the same problem with both KDE and dwm, I tried switching to newer virtualbox betas and compiling the client stuff myself to no avail. Still seem whenever I drag the mouse jumps to corners. Disabling guest additions works to fix it, but it's a terrible solution. Anyone have a better fix or other ideas? Should I report this upstream?

korgan1983 · 2012-08-07 05:51:53

Same Problem here!

Using Win7 64bit as host and ArchLinux 64bit as Guest in VirtualBox with gnome3. Also a fresh installation didn't solve the problem.

Mouse "moves" or "jumps" to the left top corner. If you try to move a window or resize it, its then a small window Also the map movement in google maps or something else is not working, because the mouse always tries to jump (or reset position) to top left corner.

Top left corner means on gnome 3 systems, the window overview and application search starts.

WhiteShadow · 2012-08-07 10:19:40

does your mouse-cursor jump, too? Or is the cursor in the right spot, but the window jumps?

For me the "displayed" cursor behaves correct, but the underlying mouse position seems to be broken (jumping).

korgan1983 · 2012-08-07 11:23:17

yes, that seems to be also on my system. Mouse displayed correct, but the movemend underlying is jumping

th0r12 · 2012-08-19 07:40:37

The exactly same problem! Is there any solution?

WhiteShadow · 2012-08-22 07:58:16

update to version 4.1.20 of vbox didn't change anything.

droosa · 2012-08-22 12:18:17

Reporting the same issue here. Visible pointer stays in the same location, but the mouse registers location at corners/top/bottom sporadically. I've found it happens in Gnome, XFCE, and KDE, and as with everybody else disabling the vbox modules seems to fix it.

How do we start debugging this? I'll have some free time the next few nights to dig further, just not right now.

Thoughts on where to start:
- CLI tool for X that lists out all mouse events (haven't been able to find it yet). Maybe there's a pattern?
- Systemtap script on key on some of the vbox modules?
- vbox debug modules?

ataraxia · 2012-08-22 14:30:30

It seems to be triggered by moving the mouse (even a tiny amount) while clicking any button (including wheel) in my case. I had success working around it by disabling "Enable absolute pointing device" in the System -> Motherboard tab of Virtualbox (which may give some insight into what's actually going on here).

Last edited by ataraxia (2012-08-22 14:30:56)

WhiteShadow · 2012-08-22 21:04:36

disabling "enable absolute pointing device" doesn't solve the issue for me.

@droosa: maybe you want to try out the guest additions from vbox, not the ones from arch - if that works, we know that the arch guest additions are broken.

droosa · 2012-08-23 02:15:53

@ataraxia: No such luck on my end

@WhiteShadow: Working on it, but can't seem to get the VBox additions to install. New to arch and having to fight the muscle memory of typing `rpm` or `yum` at every turn. I'll update when I succeed.

droosa · 2012-08-23 03:01:46

Finally managed to get the vbox guest additions installed from source after doing the following

# pacman -Rnsc virtualbox-archlinux-additions
# pacman -S make
# pacman -S linux-headers

# cd /run/media/droosa/VBOXADDITIONS_4.1.20_80170
# export KERN_DIR=/usr/src/linux-3.4.9-1-ARCH/
# ./VBoxLinuxAdditions.run
# mkinitcpio -p linux

Same problems, so it's module code related somehow.

Disabling them required commenting out parts of /etc/rc.local, /etc/rc.conf, and /etc/udev/rules.d/60-vboxadd.rules. This may have been heavy handed, but after repeated attempts I went brute force with a recursive grep through /etc/ for vbox.

If anybody else wants to do some testing, I found the easy way to show evidence of the problem was with gnome-shell. The mouse often hits the hotspot in the top left. Toggling the No Topleft Hot Corner Extension on/off made using the OS less painful while making edits.'

Anybody have thoughts on how to track this further? Should have some free time in the next couple days.

WhiteShadow · 2012-08-23 07:32:12

@droosa: there is a built in debugger http://www.virtualbox.org/manual/ch12.html#idp12223584 - if you want, you can give it a try. -- I have no idea were to start - it seems to be 64bit related; xrandr, X11 and vbox could cause the problem; it's DE independent; could even be a kernel problem.

I think it's ArchLinux specific, 'cause I haven't found anything else to that problem. Maybe it would be a good idea to install another Linux in the same vbox to test, whether it is only ArchLinux related or not. Then I guess someone should fill a bug report.

th0r12 · 2012-08-23 07:38:03

@WhiteShadow: Yes, it's ArchLinux specific. I have also Ubuntu 12.04 VM running in the VirtualBox and there is no such bug in it. Why do you think that this is 64bit specific?

bzt · 2012-08-23 08:38:16

I also see the problem with the spontaneous hot corner activation but I have a more annoying problem with sound not working in guest at all. However, it works after killing Pulseaudio. It used to work a while ago. Sound is working fine with Ubuntu and Pulseaudio. Maybe there is a connection between this and the initial problem?

Anyone with the combination Virtualbox + GNOME + Pulseaudio can confirm he also has non-working sound?

bernarcher · 2012-08-23 09:00:22

bzt wrote:

I also see the problem with the spontaneous hot corner activation but I have a more annoying problem with sound not working in guest at all. However, it works after killing Pulseaudio. It used to work a while ago. Sound is working fine with Ubuntu and Pulseaudio. Maybe there is a connection between this and the initial problem?
Anyone with the combination Virtualbox + GNOME + Pulseaudio can confirm he also has non-working sound?

This is a no-no, bzt! Do not hijack this thread. Open a new one if you need to. And, please, do not forget to search the forums before.

droosa · 2012-08-23 11:50:16

I agree with th0r12 that it seems to be arch specific, at least from the other virts I've tested (Fedora 16 and Fedora 17, atm). This is likely related to versions of the packages on those distros being behind archlinux package versions. Perhaps this issue is already documented in a bug tracker somewhere (xorg, vbox, etc)

I don't think that it's DE/WM specific. I can reproduce in XFCE (haven't tried any others yet). It's not as obvious as with gnome-shell's hot-corner, but there are a few ways to see evidence of the behavior. In a browser, selecting a small amount of text when suddenly all the text is selected and scrolled to the top or bottom of the page. Right clicking in various places and seeing which context menu comes up and where it's located. I was sporadically getting context menus on the top bar. Perhaps somebody can try these in another WM.

Another interesting observation, which leaves me even more confused: If I'm at a blank desktop, with no windows open, the issue is cannot be reproduced. If I have a window open on the right half of the screen, the right half of the screen reproduces the issue, the left half (just the desktop) does not. I only spent 5 minutes on this, but it was consistent. Can anybody else confirm this behavior on their system?

th0r12 · 2012-08-23 12:06:34

droosa wrote:

I agree with th0r12 that it seems to be arch specific, at least from the other virts I've tested (Fedora 16 and Fedora 17, atm). This is likely related to versions of the packages on those distros being behind archlinux package versions. Perhaps this issue is already documented in a bug tracker somewhere (xorg, vbox, etc)
I don't think that it's DE/WM specific. I can reproduce in XFCE (haven't tried any others yet). It's not as obvious as with gnome-shell's hot-corner, but there are a few ways to see evidence of the behavior. In a browser, selecting a small amount of text when suddenly all the text is selected and scrolled to the top or bottom of the page. Right clicking in various places and seeing which context menu comes up and where it's located. I was sporadically getting context menus on the top bar. Perhaps somebody can try these in another WM.
Another interesting observation, which leaves me even more confused: If I'm at a blank desktop, with no windows open, the issue is cannot be reproduced. If I have a window open on the right half of the screen, the right half of the screen reproduces the issue, the left half (just the desktop) does not. I only spent 5 minutes on this, but it was consistent. Can anybody else confirm this behavior on their system?

1) The bug can be easily seen if you move the window with the mouse: it will sometimes jump to random parts of the desktop.
2) I can reproduce this even in the blank desktop - sometimes during mouse movement gnome's "Activities" menu appears.

droosa · 2012-08-23 12:13:50

Continuing on the some vein of the "half blank desktop" testing. Opening a terminal on half the screen, I'm unable to reproduce on the terminal half of the screen (similar to the desktop half). While checking the version (FWIW, it's XFCE Terminal Emulator 0.4.8) I found that mousing over the version pop-up does show the sporadic mouse movement. So the main area of the terminal works as expected, the pop-up shows periodic mouse jumping.

Once again, if anybody can verify this behavior, we can be sure that this isn't something unique to my environment.

One other factor that may be involved is the host system graphics/driver versions. I'm on NVIDIA Geforce GTS 250 with the 295.73 driver. Going to update this to see if it makes a difference. If you are on different graphics cards and/or driver versions, we can rule this as (un)related.

droosa · 2012-08-23 12:16:34

th0r12 wrote:

1) The bug can be easily seen if you move the window with the mouse: it will sometimes jump to random parts of the desktop.

Same here.

th0r12 wrote:

2) I can reproduce this even in the blank desktop - sometimes during mouse movement gnome's "Activities" menu appears.

Also in gnome-shell? If you are in another DE, there may be differences in how the desktop is rendered.

c0de · 2012-08-23 12:36:17

Same issue here.

I installed OPENBOX and AWESOME and works flawless. Could be something related to GNOME and KDE ?

Last edited by c0de (2012-08-23 12:36:29)

WhiteShadow · 2012-08-23 13:04:53

anyone here with 32bit ArchLinux and or Windows Host?

I tested it in xfce and KDE - both broken.

@c0de: you say it works if you use Openbox but not with Gnome or KDE?

I don't think it's the graphics card - I have an AMD HD6900 with up-to-date drivers (updated a few days ago, didn't change)

Arch Linux

#1 2012-07-27 22:56:36

Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#2 2012-07-28 06:40:12

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#3 2012-07-31 09:48:31

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#4 2012-08-02 21:38:22

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#5 2012-08-06 23:41:31

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#6 2012-08-07 05:51:53

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#7 2012-08-07 10:19:40

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#8 2012-08-07 11:23:17

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#9 2012-08-19 07:40:37

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#10 2012-08-22 07:58:16

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#11 2012-08-22 12:18:17

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#12 2012-08-22 14:30:30

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#13 2012-08-22 21:04:36

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#14 2012-08-23 02:15:53

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#15 2012-08-23 03:01:46

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#16 2012-08-23 07:32:12

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#17 2012-08-23 07:38:03

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#18 2012-08-23 08:38:16

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#19 2012-08-23 09:00:22

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#20 2012-08-23 11:50:16

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#21 2012-08-23 12:06:34

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#22 2012-08-23 12:13:50

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#23 2012-08-23 12:16:34

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#24 2012-08-23 12:36:17

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

#25 2012-08-23 13:04:53

Re: Virtualbox + GNOME + mouse = phantom clicks

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