When this patch is required⌗

  • When you are using GNU/Linux Devuan v 2 (ASCII), latest (for 2018-04-23) OS provided kernel 4.15.0-0.bpo.2-amd64 and Virtualbox 5.1 (which was latest for ASCII available from devuan repo at moment when this was written)

Why this patch is required⌗

  • Because some of Linux kernel function names changed and DKMS vboxdrv rebuild step, which compile new kernel module for VirtualBox, will permanentny fail with compile errors;

What you will see without patch⌗

  • VirtualBox will fail to start as there are no kernel module;
  • VirtualBox kernel module will fail to compile;
STDERR: The provider 'virtualbox' that was requested to back the machine
'default' is reporting that it isn't usable on this system. The
reason is shown below:

VirtualBox is complaining that the installation is incomplete. Please
run `VBoxManage --version` to see the error message which should contain
instructions on how to fix this error.
`

Check all vboxdrv modules⌗

find /lib/modules/* -name 'vboxdrv*'

Possible workarounds:⌗

  • Install VirtualBox 5.2 or later from non OS distro source, but from official site;

Source of patch⌗

Appling patch⌗

D=virtualbox51-dev-test1
mkdir $D
cd $D
apt-get install linux-headers-$(uname -r)
apt-get source virtualbox
#sudo apt-get build-dep virtualbox
cd virtualbox*
wget -O debian/patches/38-4.15.patch http://www.virtualbox.org/pipermail/vbox-dev/attachments/20171202/8606bf99/attachment.bin
echo "38-4.15.patch" >> debian/patches/series
#Build
dpkg-buildpackage -us -uc -d
cd ..
ls -1 *.deb
#Install:
dpkg -i *.deb

Rebuild vboxdrv kernel module⌗

##Install headers if they are not installed yet
#apt-get install linux-headers-$(uname -r)
/etc/init.d/vboxdrv setup
##OR 
#dpkg-reconfigure virtualbox-dkms

Testing⌗

$ VBoxManage --version
5.1.30_Devuanr118389
$ uname -r
4.15.0-0.bpo.2-amd64