Lucid vmware keyboard not functioning

[Chetan]

I installed Lucid-32bit-beta1 using the iso: ubuntu-10.04-beta1-desktop-i386.iso.

Host: WIndows XP 32bit
Vmware Player: 3.0.0 build-203739

Install was ok, updated the VM fine. After the updates, restarted the VM and now the keyboard doesn't work.

[astenorh (mparusinski)]

This might be a problem with VMWare.

* Can you start other VMs and use the keyboard in the VM?
Don't have another VM simply download this one : http://www.vmware.com/appliances/directory/959 (it should be less than 50 MB)

If not then try to do the following

Boot Ubuntu and before starting the system press Esc so you get to GRUB, then start the Recovery Mode for ubuntu. This should start the system without X. Then see if you can type something. That can help identifie where is the problem.

[Don Vosburg (don-vosburgs)]

This appears to be related to gdm. I can use the accessibility on-screen keyboard to log in, then the kb acts normally.

[Jason Lunt (jayswede)]

Same results with the iso: ubuntu-10.04-beta1-desktop-amd64.iso

Host Mac OS X 10.6.2 and 10.6.3
VMware Fusion 3.1 beta build 240138

Initial install works perfectly and vmware tools function properly. After updating the keyboard becomes non-responive.

Performing the Ubuntu update before installing vmware tools also results in a functioning keyboard. I have been unable to determine which package is not updating properly with vmware tools already installed.

[Gabe Gorelick (gabegorelick)]

This is most likely a VMware issue. Do you get the bug using another virtual machine, for example, VirtualBox?

[astenorh (mparusinski)]

I had once a similar problem (with gdm not responding to the keyboard) on my real Ubuntu (not Lucid though), I hacked around by using a MagicSysRq Key. More precisely the one which switches to Raw Keyboard Mode(Alt-SysRq-r), which allowed to switch to TTY1. Then in TTY1, I reinstalled Hal (but Hal doesn't exist in Lucid).

Maybe something similar could be used to work around and access the virtual consoles.

[Chetan (asalinux)]

There is no problem in my vmware player setup. All my other VMs work including older ubuntu releases, RHEL 47, windows XP and more.

[Christopher Meiklejohn (cmeiklejohn)]

I'd like to confirm this -- 9.10 upgraded to lucid beta 2 and no keyboard with gdm. All other VMs are fine.

[Christopher Meiklejohn (cmeiklejohn)]

To clarify, I'm runnng VMware Fusion 3.0.2 on Mac OS X 10.6.

[Christopher Meiklejohn (cmeiklejohn)]

Keyboard also works fine once you login -- I used the on-screen one to get in.

[Gabe Gorelick (gabegorelick)]

> All other VMs are fine.
When you say this, do you mean that all other guest operating systems work fine on VMWare, or that Lucid works fine in all other virtual machines? If Lucid works fine in other virtual machines, then that implies that it is a VMWare issue, so it is important to test this.

[Chetan (asalinux)]

All the other releases of Ubuntu *before* Lucid, install and work fine in my version of VMware player *except* Lucid. I think it is pretty clear now. Even if I test Lucid in other hypervisors it won't make a difference as Lucid won't be compatible with Vmware that is one of the largest hypervisor base.

Other Linux distributions work flawlessly in my vmware player.

[Gabe Gorelick (gabegorelick)]

It's not necessarily a matter of "Lucid has a regression that makes in not work when virtualized," but it may be "Lucid does something *new/different* that VMWare doesn't know how to handle yet." It's probably best handled on the VM side if it can be. So, the best advice is to report this to the VMware developers and see if they can figure out what's going on. I can confirm that KVM and VirtualBox both work fine for me with Lucid, so unless people can confirm this behavior in supported virtualization platforms (e.g. a virtualization tool available from the Ubuntu repositories), there's really not much that can be done here.

[Starbetrayer (starbetrayer)]

I confirm the bug, I have no keyboard, nor mouse

[Starbetrayer (starbetrayer)]

If booting normally, I can go to kdm and then I am stuck here. Otherwise, I can safeboot and log in in console and then start X with "startx".
After X is started, no more mouse or keyboard.

[phillipr (phil-valor)]

Confirmed for lates development Version of lucid. VMWare Player 3.0.0. build-203739.

This is a regression from ubuntu karmic. It happened right after the first reboot (did a dist-upgrade). All other virtual machines (still) work fine.

[phillipr (phil-valor)]

Fyi: I'm having the same issue when running the same virtual machine via recent version of virtualbox.

[Gabe Gorelick (gabegorelick)]

> I'm having the same issue when running the same virtual machine via recent
> version of virtualbox.
Thanks.

[Mitch Towner (kermiac)]

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. This particular bug has already been reported and is a duplicate of bug 548891, so it is being marked as such. Any further discussion regarding the bug should occur in the other report. Please continue to report any other bugs you may find.

As noted in bug 548891, the workaround is to reset your keyboard model by running "sudo dpkg-reconfigure console-setup" (without the quotes) on your affected Lucid virtual machines.