Why can't I find kernel headers on CentOS 7 when trying to install VirtualBox Guest Additions?

Question

I have a minimal CentOS 7 installation as a VirtualBox 5.0.16 r105871 guest on a Windows 8.1 host. uname -r reports "3.10.0-327.10.1.el7.x86_64".

When I try to run VBoxLinuxAdditions.run I get an error that "The headers for the current running kernel were not found" and suggesting I do yum install kernel-devel-3.10.0-327.10.1.el7.x86_64. Yet yum list kernel-devel shows that is already installed (as is kernel-headers and the appropriate version).

Adding some logging to vboxadd, I find that it is looking for headers in /lib/modules/3.10.0-327.10.1.el7.x86_64/build which turns out to be a dead link to a missing /usr/src/kernels/3.10.0-327.10.1.el7.x86_64. Indeed, /usr/src/kernels/ is empty.

Googling around suggests that many versions of CentOS require patches to VBGA for the installation to work but I don't see any such notes specific to CentOS 7 or that refer to missing kernel headers.

Answer 1

Prompted by https://serverfault.com/questions/613256/trying-to-remove-packages-with-yum-however-it-is-failing I did some clean up then yum list no longer showed kenel-devel so I installed it and /usr/src/kernels/ is no longer empty and installing the Guest Additions succeeds.

Answer 2

Mount VirtualBox Guest Additions drive: From device menu click on Install VirtualBox guest additions option and type the following command

yum install -y linux-headers-$(uname -r)

Copy the VBoxLinuxAdditions.run file from the drive to the root directory using following command:

cp /media/cd-rom/VBoxLinuxAdditions.run /root/

Make it executable and install it:

chmod 755 /root/VBoxLinuxAdditions.run
cd /root/Desktop
./VBoxLinuxAdditions.run

Reboot

Answer 3

By the way, now for CentOS 7, open-vm-tools is recommended officially.

$ ./vmware-install.pl

open-vm-tools packages are available from the OS vendor and VMware recommends using open-vm-tools packages. See http://kb.vmwaare.com/kb/2073803 for mroe information.

Do you still want to proceed with this installation? [yes]