Greetings,
I would like help setting host networking on a virtualbox guest. Before anyone says this has been covered a hundred times before, please consider this. After hours of searching, I can only conclude that most of the host networking information that can be found at Google only applies to network manager in Gnome or KDE not WICD, which is what I am using.
Here is my setup:
One Debian Server in virtualbox guest #3 Two desktop installs of Debian on Virtual guests 1 and 2.
Virtual guest 1 is intended to be the router. Internet via WICD

The goals for my project are as follows:

1) Use virtualboxguest #1 (Debian Desktop) as a router for Virtualbox guests 2 & 3.
2) Internet connectivity for virtualbox guest #1 via NAT or the host
Note. My eth0 & eth1 are blacklistedmodules due to the use of WICD.
3) Static IP addresses for virtualbox guests 2 & 3
4) Communication between all guest

If you know how to do all of this, please tell me. Thanks. Oh yeah, I've pretty much ruled out the Virtual manual as a useful piece of information because it is too spartan and it appears to lack the scope necessary to meet my needs.

Thanks in advance

Reply by annotation above.

You asked, "which computer is running WICD for the Internet connection -- the host or VM3?" The host currently uses WICD for internet. WICD is not installed on any guest. iwcongig = eth0, wlan0 & vboxnet0.
Each guest will access the internet if NAT is selected.
The First goal is to create a network between the guest allowing them to talk to one another. The second goal is for the Virtual machine guests 2 & 3 to be able to access the internet via Virtual machine guest 1, just like a normal network. The problem is that there are no post that deal with bridged networking, or host networking if one is running WICD. Thanks, I hope the additional info helps you to help me.

That's because it doesn't matter how the host gets its network connection; AFAIK VirtualBox uses whatever host network connection is available. You will need two virtual NICs on VM3 -- one to the host (NAT or Bridged) and one to the VMs' network (Internal Network) and the other two will need one virtual NIC each of type Internal Network. Then you set up VM3 as required to allow the other VMs to connect through it to the host and thence to the LAN and Internet.

Catkin, thanks for the info. This will take time to implement. Hopefully, I have something useful to post before Monday May 31, 2010.

I will dream of nothing else and have put the date in my diary

Good luck with it

Funny! I just saw this. However, after reading the following, you might not want to respond to me anymore.

My goal was to teach myself networking without spending money on physical hardware, and it would seem that virtualbox is not flexible enough for this task, so I may abort.

The goal was to have virtualbox guest #1 (vboxg1) serve as a firewall and router, red network. vboxg2 and vboxg3 would serve as a server and pc on the green network, trusted internal network. Last, vboxg4 would be a server in the orange network, public access server.

In actuality, on physical machines, the red network (pc eserving as a firewall router)would have a static IP assigned by the ISP. The green network would have a static IP of 192.168.2.x, assigned by me, and I would also assign static IP of 192.168.4.x to the orange network, which is the public network. Again, in real life, a switch would be placed between the green network and the computer that was serving as the firewall/router. A switch would also be placed between the orange network and the computer that was serving as the firewall/router. It would seem that virtualbox does not offer this sort of a flexibility. You mentioned virtual NICs. Are virtual NICS the network adaptors commonly associated with Virtualbox? Please advise. See what you've stepped into by responding to my post?...

Aghh! A hornet's nest!

I have no experience of setting up anything so complex using VirtualBox but do believe VirtualBox is designed to support it.

Yes, by "virtual NIC" I meant what appears under Network->"Adapter [1-4]" in the VirtualBox VM configuration GUI.

Good fortune!

This was not a hornet's nest since hornets provide more warning;this was a nest of Androctonus australis.


Thanks for yet another response. I would like to ask one more question of you. If the setup I listed above were to be applied to real machines, can you see and describe any potential problems?