Guest Customization from Catalog

[cshells]

I am new to vCD and just trying to figure out some of the different functionality.

I have a Windows Server VM in the catalog, so when I go to the catalog and "Add to My Cloud" it doesn't provide any options for guest customization. When you deploy from catalog is this not an option? I see after it is deployed in the properties it has the guest customization options, so if you can't use customization when deploying from the catalog are you supposed to set those options after deployed in the properties and then power it off and back on? Then it will run the customization?

Thanks!

Cory

[IamTHEvilONE]

Customization is more like "On/Off" than doing something with it.

When you go from Catalog > My Cloud, things like the Hostname and IP Address of the system would most likely change.  Customization will take care of this delta.  In the more common use cases, you pick a network but don't pick an IP address (it comes from a pool) to abstract the whole management of free IP addresses from the consumers view.

If the Domain Join feature is enabled, then that will also be done.

If there is a pre or post customization script, then we would also do that just before/after the customization happens.

[cshells]

I did notice that I can change Hostname and networking when I add to my cloud, but I am more curious about the other processes of guest customization. Like changing SID, local admin account, login as admin on first login, etc. I am use to vSphere where we apply the guest customization to the VM when we are deploying it.

From what I can tell, it looks like when you Add to My Cloud from catalog I can't specify any of the guest customizations, so after I deploy it I will have to go to the properties of the VM and specify the Guest Customization properties and then power it on? Is my though process correct?

I did notice the Domain Join feature, so I assume when you set that globally all VMs deployed will join the domain?

[IamTHEvilONE]

Customization settings are on a VM by VM basis (and therefore vApp by vApp basis).

You set all your customizations prior to the capture to catalog.  This way the usage of a catalog is just "Add to my Cloud" and power it on.  The setting will persist.  If you are using Fast Provisioning, then it takes very little space to have multiple variations on a given template.

Domain Join requires the SID to be regenerated, but you'll be notified about that.

Auto Login first time is under the Password section, but it requires the password to be altered.

Anything not handled by what is shown in the vCloud Director GUI/API, needs to be done via pre/post customization.