How do I NOT install VBox Guest Additions?

[Ben321]

Is it possible to set the configuration for the LMDE installer to not install VirtualBox Guest Additions? My plan is to install LMDE to a virtual harddrive (VHD) in VirtualBox, but I don't need Guest Additions, because VirtualBox itself is not the final destination of this install. This install is just to generate a harddisk image with an installed copy of LMDE on it. The next step will be to burn that harddrive image to a USB thumbdrive. That thumbdrive will be the final destination for LMDE, and then I can use that thumbdrive to boot any computer. As you can see, there's no reason to have Guest Additions on this installation of LMDE, because I never intend to actually use it in VirtualBox. VirtualBox is just the tool that I will be using to convert the ISO (DVD image) into a VHD (harddrive image).

If unfortunately the developers of LMDE have hardcoded the LMDE installer to ALWAYS install Guest Additions, is there some way to COMPLETELY remove Guest Additions? I mean so that there is no trace of it, so it will be as if it never was installed in the first place. I need a CLEAN harddrive image for use on real hardware, and it's not clean if it contains crap that is ONLY useful in a virtual machine.

[catweazel]

I don't know why Mint includes VBox plumbing, but these resources may assist you:

Code: Select all

sudo apt remove --purge virtualbox-guest*

Remove Mono, Orca and VirtualBox Guest software

The same principles in the article above should be relevant to LMDE.

https://unix.stackexchange.com/question ... -on-debian
https://askubuntu.com/questions/703746/ ... virtualbox
https://unix.stackexchange.com/question ... virtualbox

[Ben321]

I don't know why Mint includes VBox plumbing, but these resources may assist you:

Code: Select all

sudo apt remove --purge virtualbox-guest*

Remove Mono, Orca and VirtualBox Guest software

The same principles in the article above should be relevant to LMDE.

https://unix.stackexchange.com/question ... -on-debian
https://askubuntu.com/questions/703746/ ... virtualbox
https://unix.stackexchange.com/question ... virtualbox

Still not enough. After doing "sudo apt-get purge virtualbox*" and rebooting I noticed that a number of vbox guest addition features remained. While full screen mode no longer filled the screen, and instead remained at an 800x600 resolution, other features like mouse pointer integration remained. This means that there are some vbox guest addition features that come in packages NOT containing the word virtualbox, or else the uninstallers associated with these packages were poorly designed installers, and they left some files behind, files that enable some vbox guest addition features.

If you have a better suggestion, that can guarantee a 100% removal of vbox guest additions, I'm ready to hear it, because right now I'm about to pull my hair out trying to figure out how to completely remove vbox guest additions.

[catweazel]

I can't guarantee anything for you, I'm sorry. All I can give you is how I would approach what you want to achieve. Rather than using a VM I'd get a clean installation going on a spare disk then image that. It reduces the surface area of things that can go wrong.

[Ben321]

I can't guarantee anything for you, I'm sorry. All I can give you is how I would approach what you want to achieve. Rather than using a VM I'd get a clean installation going on a spare disk then image that. It reduces the surface area of things that can go wrong.

Maybe I'd do better by re-creating the ISO itself. It seems that it should be fairly simple to dump the content of the ISO using 7Zip, then edit the install script to remove all references to VirtualBox, and then just create a new ISO that includes this new script using software like MagicISO Maker or WinISO. Unfortunately I don't know where the install script file itself is stored within the ISO.

Also, what's the difference between.
apt-get purge
apt-get remove --purge
apt remove --purge

I've seen these different ways of purging packages depending on which online tutorial you are reading. I know purge is stronger than remove, but sometimes they are used together, while other times only purge is used. Also sometimes the name of the base command is "apt" rather than "apt-get". So what's the difference? Which is the most powerful (is most likely to remove dependencies of the packages in question, so as to perform the most thorough uninstallation possible)?

[catweazel]

apt is an updated apt-get, that all.

Cheers.