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I cannot enter commands at the command line in Ubuntu installed in Virtualbox as guest on Windows

Asked by Jim Pappas

I installed Ubuntu 12.10. I am using a Virtual Box on a Windows 7 OS. It worked for awhile. Yesterday there was a large file of updates that I downloaded. After the updates were installed I was instructed to restart the virtual machine. I did and everything worked fine. I did some work and powered off the virtual machine. Later I booted the system back up, logged in, and opened a command line window. The cursor had changed to a solid block from a hollow one, and now I cannot enter anything at the command line. The keyboard is ignored. The mouse works, and when I clicked on system status it shows all the USB devices, but doesn't mention the keyboard specifically. It does mention an "unknown device" which it says is captured. I presume that is the keyboard. Can you help? Thanks.

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Jim Pappas
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actionparsnip (andrew-woodhead666) said : 		#1

Have you tried xterm? Are you using a desktop OS or a server?

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Jim Pappas (jediknight190501) said : 		#2

Windows 7, desktop. What is "xterm?"

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Warren Hill (warren-hill) said : 		#3

Is it just in the terminal that the keyboard does not work or elsewhere too?

There are known issues running Ubuntu 12.10 inside virtualbox on windows 7. See here
http://askubuntu.com/questions/207813/why-does-an-ubuntu-12-10-guest-in-virtualbox-run-very-very-slowly

xterm is another terminal program

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Jim Pappas (jediknight190501) said : 		#4

Hi Warren, Andrew,
I decided to just uninstall and reinstall Linux and the Virtual Box. That solved my problem. I didn't lose much work, so no worries. I'm good to go. Thanks for the help and thanks to launchpad for having this support feature.

Best Regards,
Jim Pappas

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Steve Sauls (steve.sauls) said : 		#5

With Linux type OS's everything is a config file in your home directory. They are all hidden and begin with a period. Most problems like this are just a problem with a configuration file in your home directory. It takes a little digging but most of the time it is something as simple as a .file problem that makes it look like a huge problem. Just FYI