I have never really had a need to automate the installation of ESX until recently when we decided to evaluate Cisco UCS. During the evaluation process it became VERY apparent that the benefits that UCS brought far outweighed our current HP infrastructure. Faced with the need to re-build our entire ESX environments I began investigating different deployment options. After looking into several options I decided to use Carl Thijssen's Ultimate Deployment Appliance, which BTW is absolutely superb. It took very little time for me to create the sub-templates and kickstart scripts for both ESX Classic and ESXi. As always, please feel free to use, modify or make recommendations. I only ask that if you do have recommendations please post them with as much detail as possible so that everyone can benefit.
The following configurations are addressed:
1) Sets timezone
2) Sets authentication
3) Sets IP configuration for either the Service Console or Management network
4) Configures firewall settings
5) Sets the bootloader
6) Sets partition settings (ESX Classic ONLY)
7) Creates the VMotion port group and configures VMotion
😎 Creates the Virtual Switches
9) Creates the port groups for the Virtual Switches
10) Links the vNics to the Virtual Switches
11) Configures default profile (ESX Classic ONLY)
12) Creates local users (If necessary)
13) Configures DNS
14) Configures memory for Service Console (ESX Classic ONLY)
15) Configures NTP and SNMP
16) Configures the host file
17) Creates and configures a banner file
18) Configures SUDO (If necessary)
