Import virtual machine
Through the VMware Cloud Director® panel, you can upload OS images (ISO) and virtual machine templates (.ova
, .ovf
) to content libraries. OS images and VM templates are stored in directories. You can share directory data with other users or organizations within Cloud Director or publish for organizations to access from outside.
You can upload files to an existing directory or create a new one.
Virtual data centers in cluster SILVER-1 have restrictions on importing the VM's own ISO images. If you have problems with importing, create a ticket and provide a link to the ISO image.
1. Optional: create a directory
- From Control Panel, open the Cloud Director panel: Cloud powered by VMware → Cloud Director.
- Open the virtual data center page.
- Open the Libraries tab.
- Go to Content Libraries → Catalogs.
- Press New.
- Enter the name and description of the catalog.
- Optional: To select a storage policy, enable the toggle switch Pre-provision on specific storage policy and select the policy.
- Press OK. The new catalog will appear in the list of available catalogs.
2. Download the virtual machine template
- From Control Panel, open the Cloud Director panel: Cloud powered by VMware → Cloud Director.
- Open the virtual data center page.
- Open the Libraries tab.
- Go to Content Libraries → vApp Templates.
- Press NEW.
- Under Select Source, enter the URL of the
.ovf
/.ova
file or download the file from your computer. - Press Next.
- Enter a name and description for the template.
- Select the catalog to download.
- Press Next.
- From the Catalog menu, select the catalog where you want to load the template.
- Press Finish. The download time depends on the size of the template being downloaded and the speed of your internet connection. The new template will appear under Content Libraries → vApp Templates.
3. Download the OS image
- From Control Panel, open the Cloud Director panel: Cloud powered by VMware → Cloud Director.
- Open the virtual data center page.
- Open the Libraries tab.
- Go to Content Libraries → Media & Other.
- Press Add.
- From the Catalog menu, select the directory where you want to download the image.
- Select the ISO file to download.
- The Name field will be filled in automatically (you can change it if necessary).
- Press OK. The download time depends on the size of the template being downloaded and the speed of your internet connection. The new template will appear in the list of available templates in the Content Libraries → Media & Other list.
- After installing the OS from ISO, it is recommended to install the VMware Tools (Windows)/open-vm-tools (*nix) integration package.
Error importing template
If the task ends in an error when importing a VM template in .ova
format, you can correct it in Cloud Director or using the VMware vcd-cli
utility.
- Cloud Director
- vcd-cli
- Extract the file with an OVA archiver (e.g. tar, 7zip). The extracted folder will contain the VM template files in
.ovf
,.mf
and.vmdk
formats. - Upload template. In step 6 under Select Source, load all the files extracted by unzipping the
.ova
archive.
Through vcd-cli import of VM template is possible only in .ova
format. Files in other formats will not be recognized and will be placed under Media & Other, see vcd-cli documentation for details.
-
Install Python version 3.6 or higher and the utility vmware.github.io/vcd-cli. For Windows virtual machines, you may need to install Microsoft C++ Build Tools, available for download from Microsoft's website.
-
Connect to the organization:
vcd login <vcd> <s-xxxx> <username>
Specify:
-
<vcd>
is the address of the virtual data center:- St. Petersburg —
vcd.selectel.ru
. - Moscow —
vcd-msk.selectel.ru
.
- St. Petersburg —
-
<s-xxxx>
— organization name, can be viewed in the Cloud Director address bar or in control panel under VMware-based Cloud in the organization list; -
<username>
— username, can be viewed in control panel under Users.
-
-
Enter your password.
-
Load the
.ova
image into the desired directory:vcd catalog upload <catalog_name> <path>
Specify:
<catalog_name>
is the name of the directory;<path>
is the path to the image.
-
Review the list of directories in the organization:
vcd catalog list