packer-ubuntu-vsphere-iso

This repo builds automatically Ubuntu VM templates (Ubuntu 20.04, 22.04) for VMware vSphere environment using Hashicorp's Packer and downloads ISOs automatically.

With this repo VM templates for the following Ubuntu systems can be built.

• Ubuntu Server 20.04
• Ubuntu Server 22.04

You don't need do pre-download any Windows ISO. Ubuntu ISO files gets download automatically from public sources.

How to use this repo

Pre-requesites

Download or git clone https://github.com/andif888/packer-ubuntu-vsphere-iso.git this repo and make sure you have Packer Version 1.7.1 or later installed. If you don't know Packer, it's a single commandline binary which only needs to be on your PATH.

Step 1: Adjust variables

Rename the file variables.auto.pkrvars.hcl.sample to variables.auto.pkrvars.hcl and adjust the variables for your VMware vSphere environment. Some documentation on each variable is inside the sample file.

mv variables.auto.pkrvars.hcl.sample variables.auto.pkrvars.hcl
nano variables.auto.pkrvars.hcl

Step 2: Init Packer

Init Packer by using the following command. (Spot the dot at the end of the command!)

packer init .

Step 3: Build a VM Template

To build a VM template run one of the provided build-scripts.
For example to build a Ubuntu Server 20.04 template run:

./build-2004.sh

If you are on a Windows machine then use the build-*.ps1 files.

Optional: Template default credentials

the default credentials after a successful build are
Username: vagrant
Password: vagrant

If you would like to change the default ćredentials before a packer build, then you need to edit the following files:

• variables.auto.pkrvars.hcl
• user-data (Line 13.14; Line 41)

To generate an encypted password for user-data use the following command:

mkpasswd -m SHA-512 --rounds=4096