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VirtualBox Builder

Type: virtualbox

The VirtualBox builder is able to create VirtualBox virtual machines and export them in the OVF format.

The builder builds a virtual machine by creating a new virtual machine from scratch, booting it, installing an OS, provisioning software within the OS, then shutting it down. The result of the VirtualBox builder is a directory containing all the files necessary to run the virtual machine portably.

Basic Example

Here is a basic example. This example is not functional. It will start the OS installer but then fail because we don't provide the preseed file for Ubuntu to self-install. Still, the example serves to show the basic configuration:

{
  "type": "virtualbox",
  "guest_os_type": "Ubuntu_64",
  "iso_url": "http://releases.ubuntu.com/12.04/ubuntu-12.04.2-server-amd64.iso",
  "iso_md5": "af5f788aee1b32c4b2634734309cc9e9",
  "ssh_username": "packer",
  "ssh_wait_timeout": "30s",
  "shutdown_command": "shutdown -P now"
}

Configuration Reference

There are many configuration options available for the VirtualBox builder. They are organized below into two categories: required and optional. Within each category, the available options are alphabetized and described.

Required:

  • iso_md5 (string) - The MD5 checksum for the OS ISO file. Because ISO files are so large, this is required and Packer will verify it prior to booting a virtual machine with the ISO attached.

  • iso_url (string) - A URL to the ISO containing the installation image. This URL can be either an HTTP URL or a file URL (or path to a file). If this is an HTTP URL, Packer will download it and cache it between runs.

  • ssh_username (string) - The username to use to SSH into the machine once the OS is installed.

Optional:

  • boot_command (array of strings) - This is an array of commands to type when the virtual machine is first booted. The goal of these commands should be to type just enough to initialize the operating system installer. Special keys can be typed as well, and are covered in the section below on the boot command. If this is not specified, it is assumed the installer will start itself.

  • boot_wait (string) - The time to wait after booting the initial virtual machine before typing the boot_command. The value of this should be a duration. Examples are "5s" and "1m30s" which will cause Packer to wait five seconds and one minute 30 seconds, respectively. If this isn't specified, the default is 10 seconds.

  • disk_size (int) - The size, in megabytes, of the hard disk to create for the VM. By default, this is 40000 (40 GB).

  • guest_additions_path (string) - The path on the guest virtual machine where the VirtualBox guest additions ISO will be uploaded. By default this is "VBoxGuestAdditions.iso" which should upload into the login directory of the user. This is a configuration template where the Version variable is replaced with the VirtualBox version.

  • guest_os_type (string) - The guest OS type being installed. By default this is "other", but you can get dramatic performance improvements by setting this to the proper value. To view all available values for this run VBoxManage list ostypes. Setting the correct value hints to VirtualBox how to optimize the virtual hardware to work best with that operating system.

  • headless (bool) - Packer defaults to building VirtualBox virtual machines by launching a GUI that shows the console of the machine being built. When this value is set to true, the machine will start without a console.

  • http_directory (string) - Path to a directory to serve using an HTTP server. The files in this directory will be available over HTTP that will be requestable from the virtual machine. This is useful for hosting kickstart files and so on. By default this is "", which means no HTTP server will be started. The address and port of the HTTP server will be available as variables in boot_command. This is covered in more detail below.

  • http_port_min and http_port_max (int) - These are the minimum and maximum port to use for the HTTP server started to serve the http_directory. Because Packer often runs in parallel, Packer will choose a randomly available port in this range to run the HTTP server. If you want to force the HTTP server to be on one port, make this minimum and maximum port the same. By default the values are 8000 and 9000, respectively.

  • output_directory (string) - This is the path to the directory where the resulting virtual machine will be created. This may be relative or absolute. If relative, the path is relative to the working directory when packer is executed. This directory must not exist or be empty prior to running the builder. By default this is "output-BUILDNAME" where "BUILDNAME" is the name of the build.

  • shutdown_command (string) - The command to use to gracefully shut down the machine once all the provisioning is done. By default this is an empty string, which tells Packer to just forcefully shut down the machine.

  • shutdown_timeout (string) - The amount of time to wait after executing the shutdown_command for the virtual machine to actually shut down. If it doesn't shut down in this time, it is an error. By default, the timeout is "5m", or five minutes.

  • ssh_host_port_min and ssh_host_port_max (uint) - The minimum and maximum port to use for the SSH port on the host machine which is forwarded to the SSH port on the guest machine. Because Packer often runs in parallel, Packer will choose a randomly available port in this range to use as the host port.

  • ssh_password (string) - The password for ssh_username to use to authenticate with SSH. By default this is the empty string.

  • ssh_port (int) - The port that SSH will be listening on in the guest virtual machine. By default this is 22.

  • ssh_wait_timeout (string) - The duration to wait for SSH to become available. By default this is "20m", or 20 minutes. Note that this should be quite long since the timer begins as soon as the virtual machine is booted.

  • vboxmanage (array of array of strings) - Custom VBoxManage commands to execute in order to further customize the virtual machine being created. The value of this is an array of commands to execute. The commands are executed in the order defined in the template. For each command, the command is defined itself as an array of strings, where each string represents a single argument on the command-line to VBoxManage (but excluding VBoxManage itself). Each arg is treated as a configuration template, where the Name variable is replaced with the VM name. More details on how to use VBoxManage are below.

  • virtualbox_version_file (string) - The path within the virtual machine to upload a file that contains the VirtualBox version that was used to create the machine. This information can be useful for provisioning. By default this is ".vbox_version", which will generally upload it into the home directory.

  • vm_name (string) - This is the name of the VMX file for the new virtual machine, without the file extension. By default this is "packer-BUILDNAME", where "BUILDNAME" is the name of the build.

Boot Command

The boot_command configuration is very important: it specifies the keys to type when the virtual machine is first booted in order to start the OS installer. This command is typed after boot_wait, which gives the virtual machine some time to actually load the ISO.

As documented above, the boot_command is an array of strings. The strings are all typed in sequence. It is an array only to improve readability within the template.

The boot command is "typed" character for character over a VNC connection to the machine, simulating a human actually typing the keyboard. There are a set of special keys available. If these are in your boot command, they will be replaced by the proper key:

  • <enter> and <return> - Simulates an actual "enter" or "return" keypress.

  • <esc> - Simulates pressing the escape key.

  • <tab> - Simulates pressing the tab key.

  • <wait> <wait5> <wait10> - Adds a 1, 5 or 10 second pause before sending any additional keys. This is useful if you have to generally wait for the UI to update before typing more.

In addition to the special keys, each command to type is treated as a configuration template. The available variables are:

  • HTTPIP and HTTPPort - The IP and port, respectively of an HTTP server that is started serving the directory specified by the http_directory configuration parameter. If http_directory isn't specified, these will be blank!

Example boot command. This is actually a working boot command used to start an Ubuntu 12.04 installer:

[
  "<esc><esc><enter><wait>",
  "/install/vmlinuz noapic ",
  "preseed/url=http://{{ .HTTPIP }}:{{ .HTTPPort }}/preseed.cfg ",
  "debian-installer=en_US auto locale=en_US kbd-chooser/method=us ",
  "hostname={{ .Name }} ",
  "fb=false debconf/frontend=noninteractive ",
  "keyboard-configuration/modelcode=SKIP keyboard-configuration/layout=USA ",
  "keyboard-configuration/variant=USA console-setup/ask_detect=false ",
  "initrd=/install/initrd.gz -- <enter>"
]

Guest Additions

Packer will automatically download the proper guest additions for the version of VirtualBox that is running and upload those guest additions into the virtual machine so that provisioners can easily install them.

Packer downloads the guest additions from the official VirtualBox website, and verifies the file with the official checksums released by VirtualBox.

After the virtual machine is up and the operating system is installed, Packer uploads the guest additions into the virtual machine. The path where they are uploaded is controllable by guest_additions_path, and defaults to "VBoxGuestAdditions.iso". Without an absolute path, it is uploaded to the home directory of the SSH user.

VBoxManage Commands

In order to perform extra customization of the virtual machine, a template can define extra calls to VBoxMangage to perform. VBoxManage is the command-line interface to VirtualBox where you can completely control VirtualBox. It can be used to do things such as set RAM, CPUs, etc.

Extra VBoxManage commands are defined in the template in the vboxmanage section. An example is shown below that sets the memory and number of CPUs within the virtual machine:

{
  "vboxmanage": [
    ["modifyvm", "{{.Name}}", "--memory", "1024"],
    ["modifyvm", "{{.Name}}", "--cpus", "2"]
  ]
}

The value of vboxmanage is an array of commands to execute. These commands are executed in the order defined. So in the above example, the memory will be set followed by the CPUs.

Each command itself is an array of strings, where each string is an argument to VBoxManage. Each argument is treated as a configuration template. The only available variable is Name which is replaced with the unique name of the VM, which is required for many VBoxManage calls.