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Import a virtual machine to the public cloud
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Import a virtual machine to the public cloud

Through the VMware Cloud Director® dashboard, you can download operating system images (ISOs) and virtual machine templates (.ova, .ovf) into content libraries. OS images and VM templates are stored in catalogs. You can share catalog data with other users or organizations within Cloud Director, or publish for external organizations to access.

You can upload files to an existing directory or create a new one.

In virtual data centers in cluster SILVER-1 has restrictions on importing your own ISO images of VMs. If there are problems with importing file a ticket and provide a link to the ISO image.

  1. Optional: create a directory.
  2. Load the virtual machine template into the directory.
  3. Download the OS image.

1. optional: create a directory⁠

  1. From control panels open the Cloud Director panel: in the top menu, click Products → VMware-based cloud → section Cloud Director.
  2. Open the virtual data center page.
  3. Open the tab Content Hub.
  4. Go to the section Catalogs.
  5. Click New.
  6. In the field Name enter the name of the directory.
  7. Optional: in the field Description enter a description of the catalog.
  8. Optional: to select the storage policy, activate the toggle switch Pre-provision on specific storage policy and select a policy.
  9. Click OK. The new catalog will appear in the list of available catalogs.

2. Download the virtual machine template⁠

  1. From control panels open the Cloud Director panel: in the top menu, click Products → VMware-based cloud → section Cloud Director.

  2. Open the virtual data center page.

  3. Open the tab Content Hub.

  4. Go to the section Content.

  5. Click ADD → OVA/OVF.

  6. In step Select Source:

    6.1 Download the template:

    • in the field URL enter the URL of the file .ovf/.ova;
    • or in the field Browse download the file from your computer.

    6.2. Press Next.

  7. In step Select vApp Template Name:

    7.1 In the field Name enter a name for the template.

    7.2 Optionally: in the field Description enter a description of the template.

    7.3 In the field Catalog select the directory where you want to load the template.

    7.4. Press Next.

  8. In step Ready to Complete:

    8.1 Check the data.

    8.2. 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 in the Content Libraries → vApp Templates.

3. Download the OS image⁠

  1. From control panels open the Cloud Director panel: in the top menu, click Products → VMware-based cloud → section Cloud Director.
  2. Open the virtual data center page.
  3. Go to the section Content.
  4. Click ADD → Media.
  5. In the field Catalog select the directory where you want to download the image.
  6. In the field Select media to upload select the ISO file to download.
  7. Optional: in the field Name change the name that was filled in automatically.
  8. Optional: in the field Description enter a description of the image.
  9. Click 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 following list Content Libraries → Media & Other.
  10. Optional: install the integration package after installing the OS from ISO VMware Tools™.

Error when importing a template⁠

If when importing a VM template in the following format .ova task ends in an error, you can fix it in Cloud Director or with the VMware utility vcd-cli.

  1. Unzip the file with an OVA archiver (e.g. tar, 7zip). The extracted folder will contain VM template files in the following formats .ovf, .mf и .vmdk.
  2. Download the template. When performing step 6 in section Select Source download all files extracted when unpacking the archive .ova.