Forwarded port 80 to VM using VirtualBox, how do I open access to network?

Question

I forwarded port 80 to my Ubuntu Server VM, and the website is very much accessible locally. How do I allow incoming port 80 connection to Windows 7 (so it will be forwarded to the Ubuntu Server)?

Answer 1

I read your previous post and this seems to be a bit overkill.

If I understand properly,

• You want to accept incoming request on your Windows 7 on port 80
• Forward these requests to the VM, to port 80
• handle those requests with a webserver inside the VM, listening on port 80

Why not set your Virtual Machine network into Bridged mode, and this way the Virtual Machine will get its own IP address, which you can access directly.

If you prefer to give that virtual machine a specific domain name, you can create a new domain-ip definition in the c:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc\hosts file. You can even modify localhost, but I suggest you leave it untouched and choose some other domain name (like: myvm.abc, it could be anything).

Answer 2

It sounds like to fix the problem that you're having with your setup is that you will need to route traffic from outside connections to the VM. To do this, you will need to go into your router's configuration and forward (pin hole) any traffic going to port 80 on TCP to the port 80 of your Windows 7 IP Address.

This will all be done on your router. If you have the model of your router, we may be able to come up with screenshots.