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kcarlile
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Templates and Standalone ESX 3.0

Hi, I'm a little new to all of this, so I apologize. I've done searches and haven't found the answer to the question, so...

Basically, I need to know if/how templates work with a standalone ESX 3.0.1 server. I don't have a Virtual Center server, as I only have the one ESX machine. I'd like to use templates, but I don't know if it is possible to do this with the standalone machine. If it is, how do you do it? If it isn't, what's the best way to do something template like?

Thanks!

Ken

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ilatimer
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You can go old school and do what you used to do in ESX 2.x. Basically you create a VM and load the OS, related patches and VMware tools. You then load sysprep on the VM and generate your answer file. When you are done run sysprep in the VM and have it shutdow the VM. You can now use this VM's vmdk file as a template for other VMs by exporting this vmdk file to a folder such as a templates folder on the local ESX VMFS volume. To use the template just do the following:

\- Create new VM and then delete the vmdk file

\- Import the vmdk file from the templates folder to the new VMs folder (same name as the one you deleted)

\- Power on the New VM and let sysprep run the mini setup

\- You should now have a new VM pre-configured and ready to go

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kix1979
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The easiest way is to create one VM and sysprep it after you have configured it the way you want. Then you can manually clone the VMDK files for it and assign them to a new VM. It is a manual process, but works well.

Thomas H. Bryant III
ilatimer
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You can go old school and do what you used to do in ESX 2.x. Basically you create a VM and load the OS, related patches and VMware tools. You then load sysprep on the VM and generate your answer file. When you are done run sysprep in the VM and have it shutdow the VM. You can now use this VM's vmdk file as a template for other VMs by exporting this vmdk file to a folder such as a templates folder on the local ESX VMFS volume. To use the template just do the following:

\- Create new VM and then delete the vmdk file

\- Import the vmdk file from the templates folder to the new VMs folder (same name as the one you deleted)

\- Power on the New VM and let sysprep run the mini setup

\- You should now have a new VM pre-configured and ready to go

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kcarlile
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Obviously I'm doing something wrong here. Do I need to take the entire contents of my Template machine directory and copy them into the new machine? Thanks for the help so far!

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ilatimer
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No. When the Template VM is shutdown run the following command:

vmkfstools -i /vmfs/volumes/yourvmfsname/templatevmname/templatevmname.vmdk /vmfs/volumes/yourvmfsname/template directory/templatevmname.vmdk

Create a new VM and then edit the VM and delete the hard disk

Import the template vmdk into the new VM directory by running the following command:

vmkfstools -i /vmfs/volumes/yourvmfsname/template directory/templatevmname.vmdk /vmfs/volumes/yourvmfsname/newvmname/newvmname.vmdk

kcarlile
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I'm assuming that means both the machine-flat.vmdk and the machine.vmdk. Boy, that would make a lot more sense than what I was trying...

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ilatimer
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You just need to run the command against the machine.vmdk file. The machine-flat.vmdk will automatically be created when you run the import command.

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kcarlile
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Woo! It worked. Thanks for the hand-holding.

Ken

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seanmcd
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any reason why that command would not be available on the 3.01 ESX server?

\*** EDIT - nevermind I found I had to run it from the correct path

Message was edited by: Sean m

seanmcd

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