Gazebo on virtualbox results in segmentation fault

Question

Attempting to run gazebo via roslaunch gazebo_ros on ros hydro within virtualbxo 4.3.6 on osx results in a segmentation fault. Installing virtualbox extensions and enabling 3d acceleration in the virtualbox machine does not solve the problem.

$ roslaunch gazebo_ros empty_world.launch
... logging to /home/payneio/.ros/log/7f974af4-6e56-11e3-b11b-08002763a8b0/roslaunch-payneio-ubuntu-2906.log
Checking log directory for disk usage. This may take awhile.
Press Ctrl-C to interrupt
Done checking log file disk usage. Usage is <1GB.

started roslaunch server http://payneio-ubuntu:51513/

SUMMARY
========

PARAMETERS
 * /rosdistro
 * /rosversion
 * /use_sim_time

NODES
  /
    gazebo (gazebo_ros/gzserver)
    gazebo_gui (gazebo_ros/gzclient)

auto-starting new master
process[master]: started with pid [2920]
ROS_MASTER_URI=http://localhost:11311

setting /run_id to 7f974af4-6e56-11e3-b11b-08002763a8b0
process[rosout-1]: started with pid [2933]
started core service [/rosout]
process[gazebo-2]: started with pid [2947]
process[gazebo_gui-3]: started with pid [2952]
Gazebo multi-robot simulator, version 1.9.2
Copyright (C) 2013 Open Source Robotics Foundation.
Released under the Apache 2 License.
http://gazebosim.org

Gazebo multi-robot simulator, version 1.9.2
Copyright (C) 2013 Open Source Robotics Foundation.
Released under the Apache 2 License.
http://gazebosim.org

Msg Waiting for master.[ INFO] [1388080354.950623737]: Finished loading Gazebo ROS API Plugin.
Msg Waiting for master
[ INFO] [1388080354.952556883]: waitForService: Service [/gazebo/set_physics_properties] has not been advertised, waiting...
Msg Connected to gazebo master @ http://127.0.0.1:11345
Msg Publicized address: 10.0.2.15
OpenGL Warning: glFlushVertexArrayRangeNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glVertexArrayRangeNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glCombinerInputNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glCombinerOutputNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glCombinerParameterfNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glCombinerParameterfvNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glCombinerParameteriNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glCombinerParameterivNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glFinalCombinerInputNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glGetCombinerInputParameterfvNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glGetCombinerInputParameterivNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glGetCombinerOutputParameterfvNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glGetCombinerOutputParameterivNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glGetFinalCombinerInputParameterfvNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glGetFinalCombinerInputParameterivNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glDeleteFencesNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glFinishFenceNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glGenFencesNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glGetFenceivNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glIsFenceNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glSetFenceNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glTestFenceNV not found in mesa table

Msg Connected to gazebo master @ http://127.0.0.1:11345
Msg Publicized address: 10.0.2.15
OpenGL Warning: glFlushVertexArrayRangeNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glVertexArrayRangeNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glCombinerInputNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glCombinerOutputNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glCombinerParameterfNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glCombinerParameterfvNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glCombinerParameteriNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glCombinerParameterivNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glFinalCombinerInputNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glGetCombinerInputParameterfvNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glGetCombinerInputParameterivNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glGetCombinerOutputParameterfvNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glGetCombinerOutputParameterivNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glGetFinalCombinerInputParameterfvNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glGetFinalCombinerInputParameterivNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glDeleteFencesNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glFinishFenceNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glGenFencesNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glGetFenceivNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glIsFenceNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glSetFenceNV not found in mesa table
OpenGL Warning: glTestFenceNV not found in mesa table
[ INFO] [1388080356.166684005, 0.022000000]: waitForService: Service [/gazebo/set_physics_properties] is now available.
[ INFO] [1388080356.290063300, 0.104000000]: Physics dynamic reconfigure ready.
OpenGL Warning: crPixelCopy3D:  simply crMemcpy'ing from srcPtr to dstPtr
OpenGL Warning: crPixelCopy3D:  simply crMemcpy'ing from srcPtr to dstPtr
OpenGL Warning: crPixelCopy3D:  simply crMemcpy'ing from srcPtr to dstPtr
OpenGL Warning: crPixelCopy3D:  simply crMemcpy'ing from srcPtr to dstPtr
Segmentation fault (core dumped)
[gazebo_gui-3] process has died [pid 2952, exit code 139, cmd /opt/ros/hydro/lib/gazebo_ros/gzclient __name:=gazebo_gui __log:=/home/payneio/.ros/log/7f974af4-6e56-11e3-b11b-08002763a8b0/gazebo_gui-3.log].
log file: /home/payneio/.ros/log/7f974af4-6e56-11e3-b11b-08002763a8b0/gazebo_gui-3*.log
^C[gazebo-2] killing on exit
Segmentation fault (core dumped)

Answer 1

For some reason, virtualbox 4.3 hardware 3d acceleration seems not to be working. As a workaround, I told Gazebo to use software acceleration by using this in the console:

export LIBGL_ALWAYS_SOFTWARE=1

And then gazebo launched without a segmentation fault.