Vmware suite crashes with overlay scrollbars

[Kenneth Rawlings]

Binary package hint: overlay-scrollbar

After Natty AMD64 updated to overlay-scrollbar_0.1.9-ubuntu1, the vmware workstation (version 7.1.4 64-bit) application crashes while pausing virtual machines. It also causes vmware workstation to crash when starting more than 1 virtual machine.

I was able to resolve this issue by downgrading to overlay-scrollbar_0.1.7-0ubuntu1.

liboverlay-scrollbar_0.1.9-0ubuntu1 also needed to be downgraded.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 11.04
Package: overlay-scrollbar 0.1.7-0ubuntu1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.38-8.42-generic 2.6.38.2
Uname: Linux 2.6.38-8-generic x86_64
Architecture: amd64
Date: Mon Apr 25 19:30:04 2011
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 11.04 "Natty Narwhal" - Beta amd64 (20110413)
PackageArchitecture: all
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=en_US:en
 PATH=(custom, user)
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: overlay-scrollbar
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

[Andrea Cimitan (cimi)]

do you have a stacktrace? something I could use to see what is making vmware crash?

[Kenneth Rawlings (rawlink)]

On the forums in response to my suggestion to downgrade the lib, Heroprotago suggests using the LD_PRELOAD environment variable to force vmware to use the glib it is shipped with.

export LD_PRELOAD=/usr/lib/vmware/lib/libglib-2.0.so.0/libglib-2.0.so.0

He suggests putting this in the vmware shell script. I would recommend creating your own shell script that exports this environment variable and calls the vmware script so it is persistent across vmware upgrades.

Visit the following links for information:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=10721766&postcount=17
http://developers-developers-developers.blogspot.com/2011/04/ubuntu-1104-vmware-player-dies-when.html

It is a usable workaround while waiting for a fix.

[Andrea Cimitan (cimi)]

blacklisted vmplayer

[Andrea Cimitan (cimi)]

and vmware

[Kenneth Rawlings (rawlink)]

Thank you very much Andrea. I appreciate all the great work Canonical and its employees (you) do.

[Martin Pitt (pitti)]

Accepted overlay-scrollbar into natty-proposed, the package will build now and be available in a few hours. Please test and give feedback here. See https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Testing/EnableProposed for documentation how to enable and use -proposed. Thank you in advance!

[Kenneth Rawlings (rawlink)]

Confirming that 0.1.10-ubuntu1 version fixed the issue for me for both vmware workstation and vmware player. Thanks again!

[Geoff Hickey (ardri)]

This is still happening for me after updating to the overlay-scrollbar from natty-proposed and restarting X.

geoff@serenity:~$ aptsh overlay-scrollbar
Package: overlay-scrollbar
New: yes
State: installed
Automatically installed: no
Version: 0.1.10-0ubuntu1

In my case vmware will crash if I switch to a console window for a running vm, or select Help/Check for updates.

Setting LD_PRELOAD=... as described in a previous comment lets vmware run without crashing.

I've attached a backtrace. Hope it helps.

[Andrea Cimitan (cimi)]

which app? vmplayer was fixed in 0.1.12, I forgot to add it to 0.1.10

[Stefan Brozinski (stefan-brozinski)]

Woudn't it be great to move the blacklist out of the C code into a configuration file?

[Geoff Hickey (ardri)]

This is vmware workstation, but I just tried vmware player on the same system, and it also crashed while trying to start a VM (the VM started, but vmware player crashed.)

This latest test is with 0.1.12:

geoff@serenity:~$ aptitude show overlay-scrollbar
Package: overlay-scrollbar
New: yes
State: installed
Automatically installed: no
Version: 0.1.12-0ubuntu1
Priority: optional

[Andrea Cimitan (cimi)]

how did you start vmware player?
Could you install this and tell me what's printed on the terminal (something like "program: gnucash, g_get_prgname (): gnucash")
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/overlay-scrollbar/+bug/769277/+attachment/2084867/+files/liboverlay-scrollbar-0.1-0_0.1.9-0ubuntu1_i386.deb

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

This bug was fixed in the package overlay-scrollbar - 0.1.12-0ubuntu1

---------------
overlay-scrollbar (0.1.12-0ubuntu1) natty-proposed; urgency=low

  * New upstream release.
    - Updated blacklist:
      * -deja-dup
      * -inkscape
      * -lshw-gtk
      * +vmplayer
    - some apps show grey overlay instead orange even if the window is
      focused (LP: #771511)
    - anjuta doesn't display scrollbar after resetting the layout (LP: #771563)
  * debian/control
    - Changed maintainer to ~ubuntu-desktop

overlay-scrollbar (0.1.10-0ubuntu1) natty-proposed; urgency=low

  * New upstream release.
    - Updated blacklist:
      * vmware (LP: #770625)
      * gnucash (LP: #770304)
      * pgadmin3, codeblocks and codelite (LP: #769232)
    - liferea and cardapio requires
      GDK_POINTER_MOTION_MASK (LP: #769217) (LP: #769460)
    - liboverlay doesn't work in detached tabs (LP: #769427)
    - Scrollbar's slider appears away from the mouse (LP: #763707)
 -- Ken VanDine <email address hidden> Wed, 27 Apr 2011 10:23:24 -0400

[Martin Pitt (pitti)]

Copied to oneiric as well.