Debian 10 guest customizaion

[1337Thomas]

Hi guys,

Does anyone know why Debian is not on the support matrix of guest customization?

https://partnerweb.vmware.com/programs/guestOS/guest-os-customization-matrix.pdf

when we try to use customization, we receive an error.

Status:

Customization of the guest operating system 'debian10_64Guest' is not supported in this configuration. Microsoft Vista (TM) and Linux guests with Logical Volume Manager are supported only for recent ESX host and VMware Tools versions. Refer to vCenter documentation for supported configurations.

Initiator: domain\deploy

Target:

template-debian-10

thanks for any input.

[Alex_Romeo]

Hi,

Why Debian is not in the compatibility matrix I would say it is a slightly unanswered question, generally the reason is not published.

ARomeo

[1337Thomas]

Hi,

maybe I should have formulated the question different, does anyone know if it is possible to get it to work?

because other distros are there and working and supported. Or is debian so fundamentally different that it just won't work..

[VivekThacker]

Hello,

You can try to change the below setting for the VM installed with Debian OS.

Guest OS Family: Other

Guest OS Version:  Other (64 bit)

Post that check whether the customization is working or not.

[ehertzuk]

FYI, this works. I had similar errors trying to template Debian 9 and Debian 10 on VCSA 6.7/vSphere 6.7 latest updates. I installed perl, open-vm-tools, net-tool, etc etc to no avail.

Changing the VM to 'Ubuntu 64', then templating made it all work.

Sigh.

[timblaktu]

Can someone give explicit advice on how exactly they set the guest OS id/type on these templates? I do not see how to do this manually in the vSphere/vCenter UI.

My template is created by Packer, using the vsphere-iso builder, and the guest_os_type parameter, which I've set to "OtherGuest64".

During the packer build, I can see the machine's "Guest OS" initially showing up in vSphere as "Other 64 bit", but after the OS is installed (pre-seeded  install from Debian 10 64 bit iso), the "Guest OS" changes to "Debian GNU/Linux 10 (64-bit)".

Subsequent attempts to change the Guest OS type during cloning of this template, using the guest_id parameter of the vsphere_virtual_machine resource in the Terraform vsphere provider, result in errors essentially saying "can't do that":

Error: invalid guest ID "Other 64 bibt" for clone. Please set it to "debian10_64Guest"

So, back to my original question, how can I change the "Guest OS" in a vSphere template?? Manually or through Packer/Terraform/Ansible... Thanks!

---

[timblaktu]

OK, I see now that you cannot edit Guest OS type of a template directly (by design?), but I was able to:

• convert the template to VM,
• edit settings,
• VM Options,
• change Guest OS type to "Other Linux 64bit", then
• convert back to template. 

and my subsequent Terraform plan which clones the template, and provides a customization:

 clone { | template_uuid = data.vsphere_virtual_machine.engineering-services-template.id | customize { | linux_options { | host_name = "jenkins-tim" | domain = local.domain | } | network_interface { | } | }

was then successful, hostname changed and everything. 

I'm still interested in how to do this with Packer or Terraform.. Perhaps I have to post-process the built template..

[daniel788]

I would love to know if there is a real solution to this issue
I also need templates

[jasonpa000]

Ran into this problem, and it looks like it's addressed in 7.0U3:  https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/85845

[mkaetm]

This is really great!

Then Debian-based distributions like Russian Astra Linux might also work. 

[shwill]

I am running into the exact same issue on 7.U3, unfortunately.