Removing Virtualbox-5.1 in a stuck state

I am not new to linux and have had to face the occasional odd package or install situation but this tops all of them. At this point I just want to kill it with fire!

I have Virtualbox-5.1 in a somewhat messed up state. It seems something went wrong when i tried to upgrade to it a couple of months back and I never bothered to investigate.
Ever since trying to install it I get error messages every time I upgrade packages. To be specific:

Running VMs found



VirtualBox is currently running. Please close it and try again. Please note that it can take up to ten seconds for VirtualBox (in particular the VBoxSVC daemon) to finish running.

Now I did the usual ps -aux | grep vbox and ps -aux | grep virtualbox and I can assure you, no vbox processes are running.

I also checked /tmp for any lock files which should be named '.vbox-username-ipc'. It is not there.

I have no idea how i got my system in this state but I would very much like to remove virtualbox without having to reinstall. Any input ?

asked Sep 21 '16 at 6:39

Klaus Steinhauer

3815

That message should be displayed only if a running VBoxSVC process was detected. Please check again and also take care of appropriate capitals.
– Takkat
Sep 21 '16 at 7:43

no matter the capitalization, no prozess containing "VB", "vb" or "virutalbox" is running.
– Klaus Steinhauer
Sep 22 '16 at 4:13

That's weird... the virtualbox code responsible for this message checks for pidof VBoxSVC. There is a single report of erroneous settings in /etc/vbox in virtualbox forums but I can't reproduce this.
– Takkat
Sep 22 '16 at 6:22

I hadn't found that thread before. But: the directory is empty.
– Klaus Steinhauer
Sep 23 '16 at 6:37

add a comment |

I am not new to linux and have had to face the occasional odd package or install situation but this tops all of them. At this point I just want to kill it with fire!

Running VMs found



VirtualBox is currently running. Please close it and try again. Please note that it can take up to ten seconds for VirtualBox (in particular the VBoxSVC daemon) to finish running.

Now I did the usual ps -aux | grep vbox and ps -aux | grep virtualbox and I can assure you, no vbox processes are running.

I also checked /tmp for any lock files which should be named '.vbox-username-ipc'. It is not there.

I have no idea how i got my system in this state but I would very much like to remove virtualbox without having to reinstall. Any input ?

asked Sep 21 '16 at 6:39

Klaus Steinhauer

3815

That message should be displayed only if a running VBoxSVC process was detected. Please check again and also take care of appropriate capitals.
– Takkat
Sep 21 '16 at 7:43

no matter the capitalization, no prozess containing "VB", "vb" or "virutalbox" is running.
– Klaus Steinhauer
Sep 22 '16 at 4:13

That's weird... the virtualbox code responsible for this message checks for pidof VBoxSVC. There is a single report of erroneous settings in /etc/vbox in virtualbox forums but I can't reproduce this.
– Takkat
Sep 22 '16 at 6:22

I hadn't found that thread before. But: the directory is empty.
– Klaus Steinhauer
Sep 23 '16 at 6:37

add a comment |

I am not new to linux and have had to face the occasional odd package or install situation but this tops all of them. At this point I just want to kill it with fire!

Running VMs found



VirtualBox is currently running. Please close it and try again. Please note that it can take up to ten seconds for VirtualBox (in particular the VBoxSVC daemon) to finish running.

Now I did the usual ps -aux | grep vbox and ps -aux | grep virtualbox and I can assure you, no vbox processes are running.

I also checked /tmp for any lock files which should be named '.vbox-username-ipc'. It is not there.

I have no idea how i got my system in this state but I would very much like to remove virtualbox without having to reinstall. Any input ?

asked Sep 21 '16 at 6:39

Klaus Steinhauer

3815

I am not new to linux and have had to face the occasional odd package or install situation but this tops all of them. At this point I just want to kill it with fire!

Running VMs found



VirtualBox is currently running. Please close it and try again. Please note that it can take up to ten seconds for VirtualBox (in particular the VBoxSVC daemon) to finish running.

Now I did the usual ps -aux | grep vbox and ps -aux | grep virtualbox and I can assure you, no vbox processes are running.

I also checked /tmp for any lock files which should be named '.vbox-username-ipc'. It is not there.

I have no idea how i got my system in this state but I would very much like to remove virtualbox without having to reinstall. Any input ?

virtualbox uninstall

asked Sep 21 '16 at 6:39

Klaus Steinhauer

3815

asked Sep 21 '16 at 6:39

Klaus Steinhauer

3815

asked Sep 21 '16 at 6:39

Klaus Steinhauer

3815

asked Sep 21 '16 at 6:39

Klaus Steinhauer

3815

asked Sep 21 '16 at 6:39

Klaus Steinhauer

3815

That message should be displayed only if a running VBoxSVC process was detected. Please check again and also take care of appropriate capitals.
– Takkat
Sep 21 '16 at 7:43

no matter the capitalization, no prozess containing "VB", "vb" or "virutalbox" is running.
– Klaus Steinhauer
Sep 22 '16 at 4:13

That's weird... the virtualbox code responsible for this message checks for pidof VBoxSVC. There is a single report of erroneous settings in /etc/vbox in virtualbox forums but I can't reproduce this.
– Takkat
Sep 22 '16 at 6:22

I hadn't found that thread before. But: the directory is empty.
– Klaus Steinhauer
Sep 23 '16 at 6:37

add a comment |

That message should be displayed only if a running VBoxSVC process was detected. Please check again and also take care of appropriate capitals.
– Takkat
Sep 21 '16 at 7:43

no matter the capitalization, no prozess containing "VB", "vb" or "virutalbox" is running.
– Klaus Steinhauer
Sep 22 '16 at 4:13

That's weird... the virtualbox code responsible for this message checks for pidof VBoxSVC. There is a single report of erroneous settings in /etc/vbox in virtualbox forums but I can't reproduce this.
– Takkat
Sep 22 '16 at 6:22

I hadn't found that thread before. But: the directory is empty.
– Klaus Steinhauer
Sep 23 '16 at 6:37

That message should be displayed only if a running VBoxSVC process was detected. Please check again and also take care of appropriate capitals.
– Takkat
Sep 21 '16 at 7:43

no matter the capitalization, no prozess containing "VB", "vb" or "virutalbox" is running.
– Klaus Steinhauer
Sep 22 '16 at 4:13

That's weird... the virtualbox code responsible for this message checks for pidof VBoxSVC. There is a single report of erroneous settings in /etc/vbox in virtualbox forums but I can't reproduce this.
– Takkat
Sep 22 '16 at 6:22

I hadn't found that thread before. But: the directory is empty.
– Klaus Steinhauer
Sep 23 '16 at 6:37

add a comment |

4 Answers
4

active

oldest

votes

I had the same problem, but just a little bit differently. I tried to reinstall virtualbox (switching from distro to official release) and it failed to uninstall, so I could not remove or install the new copy. I managed to fix the issue by creating an empty file:
/usr/lib/virtualbox/prerm-common.sh

Edit: Make the file executable with chmod +x /usr/lib/virtualbox/prerm-common.sh

Then running sudo apt-get remove virtualbox

edited Mar 21 '17 at 14:42

answered Oct 10 '16 at 20:29

TheBat

26625

4

brilliant! Thank you so much! after creating that file and chmod +x the removal finally worked!
– Klaus Steinhauer
Oct 12 '16 at 12:41

Glad it worked for you too!
– TheBat
Oct 12 '16 at 13:49

add a comment |

I had the same problem. I solved it by killing all the VB processes.

get all the processes containing VB
```
ps -A | grep VB
```

then kill all processes with the command
```
sudo kill <pid>
```

replace <pid> with the process IDs of the processes you got from above command.

then run

sudo apt-get remove virtualbox-* --purge

edited Jun 16 '17 at 20:19

TheWanderer

16k113657

answered Jun 16 '17 at 19:15

shivam dwivedi

7112

1

That's the perfect answer.
– maxagaz
Nov 24 '17 at 4:39

add a comment |

I tried everything suggested here and anywhere else but nothing worked. It kept saying that Running VMs found. What it turned out to be in the end was the fact, that there was autostart.cfg file in /ect/vbox.
After I removed/moved this file the installation went smoothly.
Hard to believe that I spent such a long time trying to resolve this.

The answer was hidden here
https://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=74786

answered Aug 23 '17 at 18:31

Vita

294

add a comment |

Run the following commands:

$ whereis vbox

copy all the folders in the output

$ sudo rm -rf (all the folders)



$ whereis virtualbox

copy all the folders in the output

$ sudo rm -rf (all folders)



$ sudo apt-get remove virtualbox-* --purge

This is how i removed it. Hope it helps.

answered Dec 18 '18 at 17:02

Anuraag Rijal

add a comment |

Your Answer

StackExchange.ready(function() {
var channelOptions = {
tags: "".split(" "),
id: "89"
};
initTagRenderer("".split(" "), "".split(" "), channelOptions);

StackExchange.using("externalEditor", function() {
// Have to fire editor after snippets, if snippets enabled
if (StackExchange.settings.snippets.snippetsEnabled) {
StackExchange.using("snippets", function() {
createEditor();
});
}
else {
createEditor();
}
});

function createEditor() {
StackExchange.prepareEditor({
heartbeatType: 'answer',
autoActivateHeartbeat: false,
convertImagesToLinks: true,
noModals: true,
showLowRepImageUploadWarning: true,
reputationToPostImages: 10,
bindNavPrevention: true,
postfix: "",
imageUploader: {
brandingHtml: "Powered by u003ca class="icon-imgur-white" href="https://imgur.com/"u003eu003c/au003e",
contentPolicyHtml: "User contributions licensed under u003ca href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/"u003ecc by-sa 3.0 with attribution requiredu003c/au003e u003ca href="https://stackoverflow.com/legal/content-policy"u003e(content policy)u003c/au003e",
allowUrls: true
},
onDemand: true,
discardSelector: ".discard-answer"
,immediatelyShowMarkdownHelp:true
});

}
});

draft saved

draft discarded

Sign up or log in

StackExchange.ready(function () {
StackExchange.helpers.onClickDraftSave('#login-link');
});

Post as a guest

Name

Required, but never shown

StackExchange.ready(
function () {
StackExchange.openid.initPostLogin('.new-post-login', 'https%3a%2f%2faskubuntu.com%2fquestions%2f827733%2fremoving-virtualbox-5-1-in-a-stuck-state%23new-answer', 'question_page');
}
);

Post as a guest

Name

Required, but never shown

4 Answers
4

active

oldest

votes

4 Answers
4

active

oldest

votes

Edit: Make the file executable with chmod +x /usr/lib/virtualbox/prerm-common.sh

Then running sudo apt-get remove virtualbox

edited Mar 21 '17 at 14:42

answered Oct 10 '16 at 20:29

TheBat

26625

4

brilliant! Thank you so much! after creating that file and chmod +x the removal finally worked!
– Klaus Steinhauer
Oct 12 '16 at 12:41

Glad it worked for you too!
– TheBat
Oct 12 '16 at 13:49

add a comment |

Edit: Make the file executable with chmod +x /usr/lib/virtualbox/prerm-common.sh

Then running sudo apt-get remove virtualbox

edited Mar 21 '17 at 14:42

answered Oct 10 '16 at 20:29

TheBat

26625

4

brilliant! Thank you so much! after creating that file and chmod +x the removal finally worked!
– Klaus Steinhauer
Oct 12 '16 at 12:41

Glad it worked for you too!
– TheBat
Oct 12 '16 at 13:49

add a comment |

Edit: Make the file executable with chmod +x /usr/lib/virtualbox/prerm-common.sh

Then running sudo apt-get remove virtualbox

edited Mar 21 '17 at 14:42

answered Oct 10 '16 at 20:29

TheBat

26625

Edit: Make the file executable with chmod +x /usr/lib/virtualbox/prerm-common.sh

Then running sudo apt-get remove virtualbox

edited Mar 21 '17 at 14:42

answered Oct 10 '16 at 20:29

TheBat

26625

edited Mar 21 '17 at 14:42

answered Oct 10 '16 at 20:29

TheBat

26625

answered Oct 10 '16 at 20:29

TheBat

26625

answered Oct 10 '16 at 20:29

TheBat

26625

4

brilliant! Thank you so much! after creating that file and chmod +x the removal finally worked!
– Klaus Steinhauer
Oct 12 '16 at 12:41

Glad it worked for you too!
– TheBat
Oct 12 '16 at 13:49

add a comment |

4

brilliant! Thank you so much! after creating that file and chmod +x the removal finally worked!
– Klaus Steinhauer
Oct 12 '16 at 12:41

Glad it worked for you too!
– TheBat
Oct 12 '16 at 13:49

brilliant! Thank you so much! after creating that file and chmod +x the removal finally worked!
– Klaus Steinhauer
Oct 12 '16 at 12:41

Glad it worked for you too!
– TheBat
Oct 12 '16 at 13:49

add a comment |

I had the same problem. I solved it by killing all the VB processes.

get all the processes containing VB
```
ps -A | grep VB
```

then kill all processes with the command
```
sudo kill <pid>
```

replace <pid> with the process IDs of the processes you got from above command.

then run

sudo apt-get remove virtualbox-* --purge

edited Jun 16 '17 at 20:19

TheWanderer

16k113657

answered Jun 16 '17 at 19:15

shivam dwivedi

7112

1

That's the perfect answer.
– maxagaz
Nov 24 '17 at 4:39

add a comment |

I had the same problem. I solved it by killing all the VB processes.

get all the processes containing VB
```
ps -A | grep VB
```

then kill all processes with the command
```
sudo kill <pid>
```

replace <pid> with the process IDs of the processes you got from above command.

then run

sudo apt-get remove virtualbox-* --purge

edited Jun 16 '17 at 20:19

TheWanderer

16k113657

answered Jun 16 '17 at 19:15

shivam dwivedi

7112

1

That's the perfect answer.
– maxagaz
Nov 24 '17 at 4:39

add a comment |

I had the same problem. I solved it by killing all the VB processes.

get all the processes containing VB
```
ps -A | grep VB
```

then kill all processes with the command
```
sudo kill <pid>
```

replace <pid> with the process IDs of the processes you got from above command.

then run

sudo apt-get remove virtualbox-* --purge

edited Jun 16 '17 at 20:19

TheWanderer

16k113657

answered Jun 16 '17 at 19:15

shivam dwivedi

7112

I had the same problem. I solved it by killing all the VB processes.

get all the processes containing VB
```
ps -A | grep VB
```

then kill all processes with the command
```
sudo kill <pid>
```

replace <pid> with the process IDs of the processes you got from above command.

then run

sudo apt-get remove virtualbox-* --purge

edited Jun 16 '17 at 20:19

TheWanderer

16k113657

answered Jun 16 '17 at 19:15

shivam dwivedi

7112

edited Jun 16 '17 at 20:19

TheWanderer

16k113657

edited Jun 16 '17 at 20:19

TheWanderer

16k113657

edited Jun 16 '17 at 20:19

TheWanderer

16k113657

answered Jun 16 '17 at 19:15

shivam dwivedi

7112

answered Jun 16 '17 at 19:15

shivam dwivedi

7112

answered Jun 16 '17 at 19:15

shivam dwivedi

7112

1

That's the perfect answer.
– maxagaz
Nov 24 '17 at 4:39

add a comment |

1

That's the perfect answer.
– maxagaz
Nov 24 '17 at 4:39

That's the perfect answer.
– maxagaz
Nov 24 '17 at 4:39

add a comment |

The answer was hidden here
https://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=74786

answered Aug 23 '17 at 18:31

Vita

294

add a comment |

The answer was hidden here
https://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=74786

answered Aug 23 '17 at 18:31

Vita

294

add a comment |

The answer was hidden here
https://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=74786

answered Aug 23 '17 at 18:31

Vita

294

The answer was hidden here
https://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=74786

answered Aug 23 '17 at 18:31

Vita

294

answered Aug 23 '17 at 18:31

Vita

294

answered Aug 23 '17 at 18:31

Vita

294

answered Aug 23 '17 at 18:31

Vita

294

add a comment |

Run the following commands:

$ whereis vbox

copy all the folders in the output

$ sudo rm -rf (all the folders)



$ whereis virtualbox

copy all the folders in the output

$ sudo rm -rf (all folders)



$ sudo apt-get remove virtualbox-* --purge

This is how i removed it. Hope it helps.

answered Dec 18 '18 at 17:02

Anuraag Rijal

add a comment |

Run the following commands:

$ whereis vbox

copy all the folders in the output

$ sudo rm -rf (all the folders)



$ whereis virtualbox

copy all the folders in the output

$ sudo rm -rf (all folders)



$ sudo apt-get remove virtualbox-* --purge

This is how i removed it. Hope it helps.

answered Dec 18 '18 at 17:02

Anuraag Rijal

add a comment |

Run the following commands:

$ whereis vbox

copy all the folders in the output

$ sudo rm -rf (all the folders)



$ whereis virtualbox

copy all the folders in the output

$ sudo rm -rf (all folders)



$ sudo apt-get remove virtualbox-* --purge

This is how i removed it. Hope it helps.

answered Dec 18 '18 at 17:02

Anuraag Rijal

Run the following commands:

$ whereis vbox

copy all the folders in the output

$ sudo rm -rf (all the folders)



$ whereis virtualbox

copy all the folders in the output

$ sudo rm -rf (all folders)



$ sudo apt-get remove virtualbox-* --purge

This is how i removed it. Hope it helps.

answered Dec 18 '18 at 17:02

Anuraag Rijal

answered Dec 18 '18 at 17:02

Anuraag Rijal

answered Dec 18 '18 at 17:02

Anuraag Rijal

answered Dec 18 '18 at 17:02

Anuraag Rijal

add a comment |

draft saved

draft discarded

Thanks for contributing an answer to Ask Ubuntu!

Please be sure to answer the question. Provide details and share your research!

But avoid …

Asking for help, clarification, or responding to other answers.

Making statements based on opinion; back them up with references or personal experience.

To learn more, see our tips on writing great answers.

Some of your past answers have not been well-received, and you're in danger of being blocked from answering.

Please pay close attention to the following guidance:

Please be sure to answer the question. Provide details and share your research!

But avoid …

Asking for help, clarification, or responding to other answers.

Making statements based on opinion; back them up with references or personal experience.

To learn more, see our tips on writing great answers.

draft saved

draft discarded

Sign up or log in

StackExchange.ready(function () {
StackExchange.helpers.onClickDraftSave('#login-link');
});

Post as a guest

Name

Required, but never shown

Post as a guest

Name

Required, but never shown

Sign up or log in

StackExchange.ready(function () {
StackExchange.helpers.onClickDraftSave('#login-link');
});

Post as a guest

Name

Required, but never shown

Sign up or log in

StackExchange.ready(function () {
StackExchange.helpers.onClickDraftSave('#login-link');
});

Post as a guest

Name

Required, but never shown

Sign up or log in

StackExchange.ready(function () {
StackExchange.helpers.onClickDraftSave('#login-link');
});

Post as a guest

Name

Required, but never shown

Name

Required, but never shown

Name

Required, but never shown

This page is only for reference, If you need detailed information, please check here

搜尋此網誌

Krdytkyu