Terraform Provider for VMware vSphere

Several vSphere providers were developed in parallel. This plugin was first, but Terraform team adopted another implementation. Bad luck, yeah.

It provides less features, but can be more stable in some cases.

This is a plugin for HashiCorp Terraform, which helps launching virtual machines on VMware vCenter.

Usage

• Download the plugin from Releases page.
• Install it, or put into a directory with configuration files.
• Create a minimal configuration file web.tf:

provider "vmware" {
  vcenter_server = "vcenter.domain.local"
  user = "root"
  password = "vmware"
}
resource "vmware_virtual_machine" "web" {
  name =  "web-1"
  image = "web-base"
}

• Modify connection settings, a name for the new virtual machine, and a name of a machine to clone from (image).
• Run:

$ terraform apply

Mandatory Parameters

• vcenter_server - address in hostname[:port] format.

• user - alternatively can be specified via VSPHERE_USER environment variable.

• password - alternatively can be specified via VSPHERE_PASSWORD environment variable.

• insecure_connection - Do not check vCenter server SSL certificate. False by default.

• name of new virtual machine.

• image - A name of a base VM or template to clone from. Should include a path in VM folder hierarchy: folder/subfolder/vm-name.

Optional Parameters

• datacenter - required, if vSphere has several datacenters.
• folder - VM folder to create the virtual machine in folder/subfolder format. By default the same, as base VM.
• host - by default the same, as base VM. Required if base image is a template.
• resource_pool in pool/nested-pool format. By default a root of the host.
• datastore - by default the same, as base VM.
• linked_clone - if false (default), full clone is performed from a current state. If true, machine is created as a linked clone from latest snapshot of base VM.
• cpus - a number of CPU sockets in the new VM. By default the same, as base VM.
• memory - RAM size in MB. By default the same, as base VM.
• configuration_parameters - custom VM parameters.
• power_on - if true (default), start the newly created machine, and wait till guest OS reports its IP address. VMware Tools must be installed. Timeout is 15 minutes.
• domain - enables guest VM customization and hostname renaming. The value specifies domain suffix, hostname is got from name.
• ip_address - static IP address.
• subnet_mask - required if ip_address is specified.
• gateway - used together with ip_address.

Computed Parameters

• ip_address - if power_on=true and VMware Tools are installed in guest OS.

Complete Example

provider "vmware" {
  vcenter_server = "vcenter.domain.local"
  user = "domain\user"
  password = "secret"
  insecure_connection = true
}

resource "vmware_virtual_machine" "frontend" {
  name =  "frontend-1"
  image = "App/Templates/frontend-base"

  datacenter = "EU"
  folder = "App/Instances"
  host = "esxi1.domain.local"
  resource_pool = "App"

  linked_clone = true
  cpus = 2
  memory = 8192
  configuration_parameters = {
    isolation.tools.copy.disable = "false"
    isolation.tools.paste.disable = "false"
  }

  power_on = true

  domain = "vsphere.test"
  ip_address = "192.168.1.10"
  subnet_mask = "255.255.255.0"
  gateway = "192.168.1.1"

  provisioner "remote-exec" {
    connection {
      user = "user"
      password = "secret"
    }
    inline = "uname"
  }

}

output "address" {
  value = "${vmware_virtual_machine.frontend.ip_address}"
}