Previous Topic: UsageNext Topic: image2class: Virtual Machine Image Import Utility

Reference Information › Command Line Shell Reference Guide › Shell Commands › Utilities › iso2class: Appliance Distro Creation Utility › Operating System Specific Considerations

Operating System Specific Considerations
Windows

It may be required to access the external network during OS installation to: Activate Windows, install security updates, install service packs, install tools or other software which you want to be present on any appliance derived from the iso2class singleton. The external interface (Local Area Connection) can be configured using either of these methods, given by example for Windows Server 2003:

To configure the external interface

When you have finished using the external interface, use the Control Panel to reset the interface to DHCP (Obtain an IP address automatically).

Windows MSI files are included with CA AppLogic® which transform a clean install of Windows 2003 SP2 into a managed appliance.

To copy an msi file to the iso2class singleton:

  1. Execute ipconfig /all in a Windows command shell and note the IP address of the DHCP server for the last enumerated connection (this always corresponds to the default interface). Note: The list may be displayed out of order.
  2. Open the URL http://IP-address:8080/download/ using Internet Explorer to obtain a directory listing which includes the MSI files.
  3. Right-click on one of the MSI files and select Save Target As to download the file to the desktop.

Important!

See the Windows Installation Reference for detailed instructions on creating Windows appliances on your grid.

If the option os=windows is used then iso2class configures the boundary of the singleton to use a copy of the volume _GLOBAL_RO:apk_windows. This volume contains the following files:

Linux

The following OS specific notes have been garnered from practical experience:

Do not install one of the CA AppLogic® Linux-based APKs during the iso2class OS installation. The iso2class singleton is HVM, while the Linux APKs are intended to be used with PV appliances.

After installing a Linux OS with iso2class, use the hvm2pv (hvm2pv: Hardware Emulation to Paravirtualized Appliance Conversion Utility, http://www.) utility to convert the HVM appliance to a fully managed PV appliance that includes a Linux APK.

Important! If you intend to convert an HVM Linux appliance to PV, pay particular attention to the section of the hvm2pv documentation titled Preparing for hvm2pv conversion.

Once an HVM Linux appliance is properly prepared as outlined in the hvm2pv documentation, it is possible to perform the conversion manually. There are two basic steps in the conversion process. First, strip the MBR from the resulting volume.

To strip the MBR from the resulting volume

  1. Create a new application including a branched LUX5 (or LUX64 if your OS is 64-bit) with two placeholder volumes, src and dst
  2. Copy the boot volume of the iso2class singleton to the src volume of the new application.
  3. Create an ext3 dst volume of the same size or larger.
  4. Edit the ADL class descriptor of the singleton and change the device of the src volume from dev = /dev/hda3 to dev = /dev/hdc and click OK to save the change.
  5. Start the application and ssh into the singleton.
  6. Mount the src volume, for example: mkdir /src ; mount /dev/hdc1 /src
  7. Mount the dst volume, for example: mkdir /dst ; mount /dev/hda4 /dst
  8. Copy the installed OS: cd /src ; /usr/bin/find . -depth -mount -print | /bin/cpio -pdmu /dst

Second, install one of the Linux APK's on the file system mounted on /dst.

To install Linux APK on the file system mounted on /dst

  1. Determine the IP address of the DHCP server for the internal interface of the branched LUX appliance: ifconfig -a and note the broadcast subnet of the last enumerated network interface, for example 10.47.255.255. The IP address for the DHCP server is identical except for the last number which is 254, for example, 10.47.255.254.
  2. wget http://IP-address:8080/download/ to obtain a file index.html which lists all of the files downloadable from the controller, including the various APK's.
  3. Use wget again to download the appropriate APK and domu package.
  4. Follow the relevant APK installation document for your OS:
  5. Use the resulting dst volume as the boot volume of a singleton.

If the option os=linux is used then iso2class configures the boundary of the singleton to use a copy of the volume _GLOBAL_RO:apk_linux. This volume contains the following files:

Solaris 10

Install Solaris 10 using console=graphic. After the install is complete, logging in to either of the graphical desktops may fail; however, the text-based login from the graphic console succeeds. This is a problem with Solaris (not a bug in CA AppLogic®).

OpenSolaris

An OpenSolaris 2008.11 appliance can be created with iso2class. The resulting appliance uses hardware virtualization (HVM) and a ZFS pool as the boot volume. CA AppLogic® does not support resizing a bootable ZFS volume using the Solaris filer.

If you would like to use paravirtualized OpenSolaris appliances, use those distributed with CA AppLogic® (they cannot be created using iso2class). These appliances use UFS boot volumes and the paravirtualized kernels.

If the option os=solaris is used then iso2class configures the boundary of the singleton to use a copy of the volume _GLOBAL_RO:apk_solars. This volume contains the following files:

Appliance access to files on the grid controller

For a list of files that are available to appliances through their default interface, refer to Accessing Files on the Grid Controller from within an Appliance.

Notes