I wasted too much time trying to boot GhostBSD XFCE in both VMWare (free version) and VirtualBox and neither worked. I booted to a black screen in both cases. After some frustration I tested the official MATE version and that worked in VirtualBox (didn't bother with VMWare this time).

So now I can finally boot into a desktop but I don't see any option to install to disk. How do you actually do this? Not very intuitive. Attaching screenshot of desktop for reference.

How much ram the VM has?

4096 MB (16 GB total on host)

I have also 4096 MB and 16 GB total and it works on my VirtualBox.
Did you try to install directly? Or is it a Live image?

I downloaded the ISO from here http://ghostbsd.org/download and it works like a Live image. How do you install it?

You are not the first reporting issue with the desktop not displaying on the live system with VirtualBox. I will need to investigate that.

You can start the installer in the terminal with gbi

I just wanted to say that everything worked fine after installing with gbi.

spanakop wrote: ↑Fri Jan 29, 2021 6:15 am … no desktop icons as before …

ericbsd wrote: ↑Tue Feb 02, 2021 9:03 am … desktop not displaying on the live system with VirtualBox. I will need to investigate that. …

I have a snapshot of a guest in this state. A screen recording of htop shows one caja process after another, endlessly, sometimes two visible.

I can work around by logging out root, just once, after which there's automated login and the four icons appear:

1. Computer
2. ghostbsd's Home
3. Install GhostBSD
4. Trash

Alternatively, although this shows more than expected:

caja --force-desktop

Comparable symptoms, some old bugs, in no particular order:

• mate-session spawns 10 x-caja-desktop windows on first login. · Issue #19 · mate-desktop/mate-session-manager – the "caja -n" hint, in particular
• #746339 - caja: Caja crashed, but spawn infinity, unable to launch others. - Debian Bug report logs
• 1242182 – Caja respawns endlessly in NX session

We did fix a problem for virtual box integration https://github.com/ghostbsd/ghostbsd-build/issues/133 and https://github.com/ghostbsd/ghostbsd-bu ... 59d18219db

grahamperrin wrote: ↑Mon Feb 15, 2021 3:39 pm … I can work around by logging out root, just once, …

Works for me with GhostBSD-21.04.26.iso in live mode.

(I might have tried to log out more than once, maybe three times, because there was no perceptible log out. Just appearance of the desktop.)