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Google Compute Builder

Type: googlecompute

The googlecompute builder is able to create images for use with Google Compute Engine (GCE) based on existing images. Google Compute Engine doesn't allow the creation of images from scratch.

Setting Up API Access

There is a small setup step required in order to obtain the credentials that Packer needs to use Google Compute Engine. This needs to be done only once if you intend to share the credentials.

In order for Packer to talk to Google Compute Engine, it will need a client secrets JSON file and a client private key. Both of these are obtained from the Google Cloud Console.

Follow the steps below:

Log into the Google Cloud Console
Click on the project you want to use Packer with (or create one if you don't have one yet).
Click "APIs & auth" in the left sidebar
Click "Credentials" in the left sidebar
Click "Create New Client ID" and choose "Service Account"
A private key will be downloaded for you. Note the password for the private key! This private key is your client private key.
After creating the account, click "Download JSON". This is your client secrets JSON file. Make sure you didn't download the JSON from the "OAuth 2.0" section! This is a common mistake and will cause the builder to not work.

Finally, one last step, you'll have to convert the p12 file you got from Google into the PEM format. You can do this with OpenSSL, which is installed standard on most Unixes:

$ openssl pkcs12 -in <path to .p12> -nocerts -passin pass:notasecret \
    -nodes -out private_key.pem

The client secrets JSON you downloaded along with the new "private_key.pem" file are the two files you need to configure Packer with to talk to GCE.

Basic Example

Below is a fully functioning example. It doesn't do anything useful, since no provisioners are defined, but it will effectively repackage an existing GCE image. The client secrets file and private key file are the files obtained in the previous section.

{
  "type": "googlecompute",
  "bucket_name": "my-project-packer-images",
  "client_secrets_file": "client_secret.json",
  "private_key_file": "XXXXXX-privatekey.p12",
  "project_id": "my-project",
  "source_image": "debian-7-wheezy-v20140415",
  "zone": "us-central1-a"
}

Configuration Reference

Configuration options are organized below into two categories: required and optional. Within each category, the available options are alphabetized and described.

Required:

bucket_name (string) - The Google Cloud Storage bucket to store the images that are created. The bucket must already exist in your project.
client_secrets_file (string) - The client secrets JSON file that was set up in the section above.
private_key_file (string) - The client private key file that was generated in the section above.
project_id (string) - The project ID that will be used to launch instances and store images.
source_image (string) - The source image to use to create the new image from. Example: "debian-7"
zone (string) - The zone in which to launch the instance used to create the image. Example: "us-central1-a"

Optional:

image_name (string) - The unique name of the resulting image. Defaults to packer-{{timestamp}}.
image_description (string) - The description of the resulting image.
instance_name (string) - A name to give the launched instance. Beware that this must be unique. Defaults to "packer-{{uuid}}".
machine_type (string) - The machine type. Defaults to n1-standard-1.
metadata (object of key/value strings)

network (string) - The Google Compute network to use for the launched instance. Defaults to default.
passphrase (string) - The passphrase to use if the private_key_file is encrypted.
ssh_port (integer) - The SSH port. Defaults to 22.
ssh_timeout (string) - The time to wait for SSH to become available. Defaults to "1m".
ssh_username (string) - The SSH username. Defaults to "root".
state_timeout (string) - The time to wait for instance state changes. Defaults to "5m".
tags (array of strings)

Gotchas

Centos images have root ssh access disabled by default. Set ssh_username to any user, which will be created by packer with sudo access.

The machine type must have a scratch disk, which means you can't use an f1-micro or g1-small to build images.

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