Installation of VirtualBox Guest Additions on Linux guest Installation is rather very simple and straight forward task ( you may have some problems due to the kernel compatibility ).

VirtualBox guest additions will add more ( depending on operation system you use ) features to your VirtualBox guest operating system such as:

• mouse pointer integration
• better video support
• time synchronization
• shared folders
• seamless windows
• shared clipboard
• automated logons

In this article we are going to install VirtualBox Guest Additions to a Ubuntu Linux guest system. Installation of Ubuntu as a virtual operation system using VirtualBox is not a part of this article so let's get straight to the point. Start your VirtualBox and Ubuntu Linux guest system.

1. Make VirtualBox Guest Additions ISO image available

On the windows where is your Ubuntu running click on : DEVICES->Install Guest Additions . This will make VirtualBox Guest Additions ISO image which is part of your VirtualBox installation available as a CD-ROM drive.

2. Mount VirtualBox Guest Additions

Inside your virtual Ubuntu system navigate to places and VBOXADDITIONS

This will open up a window and mount an ISO image to /media/VBOXADDITIOS

3. Install VirtualBox Guest Additions

The last step is to install VirtualBox Guest Additions by execution a following sequence of commands: NOTE: You do not need to cd into media directory and execution a ls command. This steps can be omitted if you know the exact name of the VBOXADDITIONS directory.

$ cd /media/
$ ls
$ cd VBOXADDTIONS_3.2.8_64453/
$ sudo ./VBoxLinuxAdditions.run

or for short:

$ sudo /media/VBOXADDTIONS_3.2.8_64453/VBoxLinuxAdditions-x86.run

And your are done.

4. Appendix

4.1. Building the VirtualBox kernel module

Building the VirtualBox kernel module. Failed to build the kernel module. 
Please check the log file /var/log/vbox-install.log

If you get this error message it is most likely that your version of VirtualBox Guest Additions is not compatible with a kernel of your guest operation system. To fix this problem download appropriate / latest version of VirtualBox Guest Additions from: http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/ and mount this ISO using VirtualBox Guest settings. Next steps are similar to steps describe earlier.