I created a Ubuntu (32 bit) VM in
Fedora 12 (64bit) on a triple core
AMD Phenom system, total memory 8GB,
VM memory 2GB; total HD 1TB, VM 16MB.
When I first created it, it seemed
to be working fine.
It demanded a bunch of updates. I let
the updates proceed, then it wanted
to be rebooted. I did so, and after
that I have not been able to log in.
On the splash screen it displays my
full name, and if I allow the mouse
pointer to hover of it, my actual
login name is displayed. If I click
on it and enter my password, it
seems to accept it, but then it just
returns to the login screen.
One might think that I mistyped the
password, but the message that is
displayed in the case of an
authentication error does not appear.
I tried shutting down the VM and
restarting it numerous times.
Does anyone have any ideas?
Thanks in advance.
Tom

Try booting the vm in single user runlevel and check free space and logs, you could also mount the virtual disk and check the log files that way.

Hello kbp,

Thanks for your suggestion. I didn't try this because I got impatient and decided to delete VM and start over before I received your message.

The first time I installed from an ISO image on the HD of the parent system. I remember getting some error message about the HD not being shared properly and asking whether the installer should fix this. I had answered yes. There was also some message about not having adequate hardware and not being able to use Unity or something like that, although my HW clearly exceeded the requirements, so I ignored the second message. I remember that when the installer finished it told me to remove the installation media and reboot, and I remember that I did NOT delete the ISO image before rebooting the VM.

I deleted the VM that kept returning to the login screen, and installed the same VM again, this time using a bootable CD, and otherwise did everything exactly the same. When it told me to remove the installation media and reboot, I followed its instructions. I got the same error message about Unity or whatever it's called, and once again ignored it. Now the VM works fine.

In case anyone else has this problem, I suspect that the problem had something to do with the installation media, that is using an ISO image on the local HD instead of a CD-ROM, or with the sharing of the ISO image or (some part of) the HD where it was located during installation.

In any case, thank you kbp for your suggestion.

Tom

Hello again kbp,

What I wrote above was not the problem. After I thought that I had gotten
the VM working, I started having the same problem again.

I followed kbp's suggestion of mounting the VM. Location of image file is:
/var/lib/libvirt/images/Ubuntu11-32bit.img

# /sbin/losetup -f
/dev/loop0
# /sbin/losetup /dev/loop0 /var/lib/libvirt/images/Ubuntu11-32bit.img
# /sbin/kpartx -av /dev/loop0
add map loop0p1 (253:0): 0 29358080 linear /dev/loop0 2048
add map loop0p5 (253:1): 0 4190208 linear /dev/loop0 29362176
# ls -alF /dev/mapper
brw-rw----. 1 root disk 253, 0 2011-09-28 20:26 loop0p1
brw-rw----. 1 root disk 253, 1 2011-09-28 20:26 loop0p5
# mkdir /tmp/tempUbuntu
# mount /dev/mapper/loop0p1 /tmp/tempUbuntu
# cd /tmp/tempUbuntu
# ls
bin dev initrd.img lost+found opt sbin sys var
boot etc initrd.img.old media proc selinux tmp vmlinuz
cdrom home lib mnt root srv usr vmlinuz.old

At this point, I was able to enter my home directory
and fix the problem. Then, of course I removed all
the temporary stuff:

# cd /
# umount /tmp/tempUbuntu
# /sbin/kpartx -dv /dev/loop1

"Wait! What was the problem?", I hear you ask.

I had made a silly mistake in the .profile and
.kshrc files (I use the Korn shell), and it was
causing a loop in the login shell. I fixed the
problem and now the VM works fine.

Thank you again, kbp, for your suggestions.

Tom[/QUOTE]