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Import virtual machine
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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-catalog.
  2. Upload the virtual machine template to the directory.
  3. Upload OS image.

1. Optional: create a directory⁠

  1. From Control Panel, open the Cloud Director panel: Cloud powered by VMware → Cloud Director.
  2. Open the virtual data center page.
  3. Open the Libraries tab.
  4. Go to Content Libraries → Catalogs.
  5. Press New.
  6. Enter the name and description of the catalog.
  7. Optional: To select a storage policy, enable the toggle switch Pre-provision on specific storage policy and select the policy.
  8. Press OK. The new catalog will appear in the list of available catalogs.

2. Download the virtual machine template⁠

  1. From Control Panel, open the Cloud Director panel: Cloud powered by VMware → Cloud Director.
  2. Open the virtual data center page.
  3. Open the Libraries tab.
  4. Go to Content Libraries → vApp Templates.
  5. Press NEW.
  6. Under Select Source, enter the URL of the .ovf/.ova file or download the file from your computer.
  7. Press Next.
  8. Enter a name and description for the template.
  9. Select the catalog to download.
  10. Press Next.
  11. From the Catalog menu, select the catalog where you want to load the template.
  12. 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

  1. From Control Panel, open the Cloud Director panel: Cloud powered by VMware → Cloud Director.
  2. Open the virtual data center page.
  3. Open the Libraries tab.
  4. Go to Content Libraries → Media & Other.
  5. Press Add.
  6. From the Catalog menu, select the directory where you want to download the image.
  7. Select the ISO file to download.
  8. The Name field will be filled in automatically (you can change it if necessary).
  9. 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.
  10. 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.

  1. 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.
  2. Upload template. In step 6 under Select Source, load all the files extracted by unzipping the .ova archive.