Creating VMs on ESXi using Packer

What is this?

This repository is a POC for creating VMs on ESXi using Packer. Things work like this:

• Packer downloads ISO and uploads to ESXi
• Packer creates VM on ESXi using SSH
• Packer hosts a web server on the jumpstart machine
• Packer modifies boot command using VNC (Presses buttons interactively)
• Boot command contains link to the jumpstart machine's web server
• Cloud init is triggered with user-data and meta-data files.

Prerequisites

• A jumpstart machine (You will run commands using this machine)
• A VMware ESXi machine* with SSH enabled (You will run commands against this machine)
• [Optional] DHCP Server if you want to use DHCP to assign IPs to VMs

• Tested on 6.7.0 Update 3 and 7.0 Update 2

Before You Start

On jumpstart

• Install packer on jumpstart machine.
• [Optional] If you want to power on VM after creation:

# Copy public key to ESXi host
ssh-copy-id root@esxi

# Login
ssh root@esxi

# Move authorized keys file, assuming you are using root user.
# Change keys-root to keys-<user> if you are logged in as a different user.
mv /.ssh/authorized_keys /etc/ssh/keys-root/authorized_keys

# Uncomment following lines in ubuntu2004.pkr.hcl
# post-processor "shell-local" {
#   inline = [
#     "vmId=$(ssh ${var.remote_username}@${var.remote_host} vim-cmd vmsvc/getallvms | grep ubuntu2004 | awk '{print $1}') && ssh ${var.remote_username}@${var.remote_host} vim-cmd vmsvc/power.on $vmId >> /dev/null"
#   ]
# }

On ESXi

• Before using a remote vSphere Hypervisor, you need to enable GuestIPHack and VNC ports from ESXi firewall. We will use local.sh script for this purpose:

# Copy init script to ESXi host via SSH
scp local.sh root@esxi:/etc/rc.local.d/local.sh

# Login
ssh root@esxi

# Make init script executable on ESXi host
chmod +x /etc/rc.local.d/local.sh

# Execute init script on ESXi host once
/etc/rc.local.d/local.sh

• Thanks to chrisipa for this script.
• If you are using ESXi 7.0 or greater remove VNC lines from local.sh file. Enable GuestIPHack only.

Run Packer

# Uncomment for detailed log
# export PACKER_LOG=1
# export PACKER_LOG_PATH="packer.log"

# Edit following files according to your needs
# ubuntu2004.pkr.hcl : VM settings
# variables.pkr.hcl  : General connection variables
# http/user-data     : Cloud init user-data (check references)
# http/meta-data     : Cloud init meta-data (check references)
packer build .

# or add variables to your command
packer build \
  -var 'datastore=VM' \
  -var 'cache_datastore=CACHE' \
  -var 'remote_host=esxi' \
  -var 'remote_username=root' \
  -var 'remote_password=password' .

References

• https://github.com/chrisipa/packer-esxi
• https://www.packer.io/docs/builders/vmware/iso
• https://ubuntu.com/server/docs/install/autoinstall-reference