Hello to all,
can you please guys help me on how to deploy an ova file from my datastore on the ESXi that I have? [6.5.0 Update 1 (Build 6765664)]
I cant find a way how to do that!
Thank you
Option | Action |
---|---|
URL | Type a URL to an OVF or OVA template located on the Internet. Supported URL sources are HTTP and HTTPS.Example: http://vmware.com/VMTN/appliance.ovf. |
Local file | Click Browse and select all the files associated with an OVF template or OVA file. This includes files such as .ovf, .vmdk, etc. If you do not select all the required files, a warning message displays. |
Option | Description |
---|---|
Publisher | Publisher of the OVF or OVA template, if a certificate included in the OVF or OVA template file specifies a publisher. |
Download size | Size of the OVF or OVA file. |
Size on disk | Size on disk after you deploy the OVF or OVA template. |
Description | Description, as provided by the distributor of the OVF or OVA template. |
Format | Description |
---|---|
Thick Provisioned Lazy Zeroed | Creates a virtual disk in a default thick format. Space required for the virtual disk is allocated when the virtual disk is created. Data remaining on the physical device is not erased during creation, but is zeroed out later, on demand, on first write from the virtual machine. |
Thick Provision Eager Zeroed | A type of thick virtual disk that supports clustering features such as Fault tolerance. Space required for the virtual disk is allocated at creation time. In contrast to the flat format, the data remaining on the physical device is zeroed out when the virtual disk is created. It might take much longer to create disks in this format than to create other types o disks. |
Thin Provision | Use this format to save storage space. For the thin disk, you provision as much datastore space as the disk requires based on the value that you enter for the disk size. However, the thin disk starts small and at first, uses only as much datastore space as the disk needs for its initial operations. |
for more information: Deploy an OVF or OVA Template in the vSphere Web Client
hello rsk007,
thank you for your help.
I know that I need to find the
URL | Type a URL to an OVF or OVA template located on the Internet. Supported URL sources are HTTP and HTTPS.Example |
---|
but I dont see it!
Did I miss something?
Thanks again!
Afaik there's no option to deploy an OVA from a datastore. Download the OVA to the system on which you run the vSphere Client, and deploy it from there.
André
Hi a.p.,
vSphere Client doesnt work with 6.5 version unfortunately.
Other suggestions?
I want to avoid reupload the file via the web client again, its taking toooo long...
Thank you
Sorry if I was unclear, I meant the Web Client.
André
Hello again,
for the vSphere Web Client if I am not wrong you need a vCenter server right?
There's a web client for vCenter Server as well as for ESXi.
Anyway, none of the clients provide an option to select an OVA that's stored on a datsatore.
André
"none of the clients provide an option to select an OVA that's stored on a datsatore."
oh.... thats bad
So there is no way.
Then each time I will need to upload the ova.... until they fix that.
Thanks for the help!
There's nothing to "fix" as OVAs and OVFs are not runtime artifacts like VMXs and their accompanying files. They're meant to be transported, stored, and then uploaded by a user or programmatically to instantiate into running VMs. The only way this will change is when the Content Library feature natively supports OVAs.
A datastore can hold ISO's too.. there is nothing wrong with that.
Why wouldn't VMware allow you to upload an ovf from its own datastore to itself which would be BY FAR the quickest option?
They need a fix, the Host Client should have an option to deploy an OVF from datastore IMO. They have before.
Hi.
You need to use ovftool do do that
in short : install ovftool ( it's command line you can find a windows version on VMware site)
get the proper url of your ova by browsing your esxi datastore (ie : https://esx2.mydomain.local/folder )
get the proper parameters for the ovtool to work
hint : when you try to install manually : you'll see the questions that need answers ( in my example : EULA and NICs matching )
Just tested from windows 10 ( only hiding my domain )
ovftool --name="bigve-4" -ds=ds2 --net:Management=MGMT --net:HA=LAB --net:Internal=DMZ --net:External=LAB -dm=thin --acceptAllEulas --noSSLVerify "https://esx2.mydomain.local/folder/kits/BIGIP-13.1.0.5-0.0.5.ALL-scsi.ova?dcPath=ha%252ddatacenter&d..." "vi://esx2.mydomain.local/"
full explanation here : https://www.virtuallyghetto.com/2012/03/how-to-deploy-ovf-located-on-esxi.html
https://www.virtuallyghetto.com/2012/03/how-to-deploy-ovf-located-on-esxi.html
How come VMware has come up with a way to deploy complete datacenters in minutes out of a template or something if wish yet somehow they haven't figured out that image sources are most likely already attached to hosts, it's in the basic settings to mount images directly to VMs! It makes no sense be able to access the files in ESXi mounted datastores but not to make use of them --if you happen to need to mount the OVA for vCenter itself-- or to hunt for URLs or download an image to a client computer only to upload it again. Six major vSphere versions and it has slipped no one's mind; impressive.
Is there something like a suggestions around?
Hello Folks,
We can follow the below steps to deploy an OVA from the datastore -
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-deploy-vmware-virtual-machine-from-ova-directly-local-gabra-1/
Regards,
Supreet
Hello,
I have tried this method and judging from the NIC usage on my PC where I executed the command ovftool still use my PC as a "proxy" to transfer the files from the url to the ESXi host, it does not instruct the ESXi host to pull the files directly from the URL without transiting through my PC like we want to.
What we want to do is avoid that and have the ESXi directly pull the files from its own datastore, this way we can maybe attain HDD speeds on OVF deployments.
Best regards.
I don't have access to the ESXi hosts directly. But, if you do, this looks like a viable option.
http://www.running-system.com/deploy-an-ovf-template-stored-on-a-local-esxi-datastore/
Hello,
An alternative solution would be to deploy basic linux vm, mount the cd (map it from your datastore).
This should give you access to the files and allow you to deploy VCSA from the desktop.
regards,
Dan
be forewarned: the method show in the provided link will expose the username and password in the events log for anyone with read-only permission to see...
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-deploy-vmware-virtual-machine-from-ova-directly-local-gabra-1/
In ESXi 7
the trick is to add "&f.ovf" at the end of the URL you copy from the datastore