CoreOS image ISO versus OVA on VMWare

[Maarten Dekker]

Hi Community,

I would really appreciate some clarification on perhaps a simple question.

Installing CoreOS on a VM can technically been done in various ways, looking at the installation media I see roughly two options:

1. Using the "generic" ISO image.

2. Using a the OVA image as per instruction (https://coreos.com/os/docs/latest/booting-on-vmware.html).

The two options work, but the question remains for me what are the differences in the two images?

Is the OVA image offering something extra? Is it better tuned for VMWare?

The main reason why I am asking is that I face some issues in a CoreOS node going down (reboot) every now and then, not related to auto reboots for updates.

Logs (journalctl) don't show any issues before the reboot happens.

In VMWare only a message remains:"The CPU has been disabled by the guest operating system. Power off or reset the virtual machine".

Please share some insights with me,

Thanks,

Maarten

[Alex Crawford]

On 10/09, Maarten Dekker wrote:
> I would really appreciate some clarification on perhaps a simple question.
> Installing CoreOS on a VM can technically been done in various ways,
> looking at the installation media I see roughly two options:
> 1. Using the "generic" ISO image.
> 2. Using a the OVA image as per instruction (
> https://coreos.com/os/docs/latest/booting-on-vmware.html).
>
> The two options work, but the question remains for me what are the
> differences in the two images?
> Is the OVA image offering something extra? Is it better tuned for VMWare?

The OVA image contains Open VM Tools which help with hypervisor
integration.

> The main reason why I am asking is that I face some issues in a CoreOS node
> going down (reboot) every now and then, not related to auto reboots for
> updates.
> Logs (journalctl) don't show any issues before the reboot happens.
> In VMWare only a message remains:"The CPU has been disabled by the guest
> operating system. Power off or reset the virtual machine".

I have not seen that issue before. It might be worth trying the OVA to
see if the problem persists.

-Alex

[Maarten Dekker]

Thanks Alex,

We will have a look on using the OVA image.

Maarten

Op dinsdag 10 oktober 2017 00:17:35 UTC+2 schreef Alex Crawford:

[Louis Parkin]

Hi Maarten

I use a customised version of the ISO, that includes a generic file system image, as well as the vmware specific filesystem image, and it prompts the user doing the live boot on whether or not to do a vmware deployment, making it so that I only need the ISO.

If this is something you are interested in, I can provide some implementation details.

Regards

Louis Parkin

[Maarten Dekker]

Hi Louis,

This sounds indeed as a more flexible approach, do you keep that ISO actively updated to the lastest version?

Let me discuss with the team what approach they would like to choose for.

But it might be that I contact you shortly for some more information about your ISO.

Thanks!

Maarten

Op woensdag 11 oktober 2017 10:16:56 UTC+2 schreef Louis Parkin:

[Louis Parkin]

Hi Maarten

The whole process of ripping the ISO apart and putting it back together is done with shell scripts, and among the shell script behaviour is an option to download the latest ISO and filesystem images.  We require a fairly new docker API, so we are running the alpha channel release at the moment, but that is obviously our preference.

The only difference between the raw filesystem image, and the vmware one, as far as I can tell, is that the vmware one comes with a vendor installation of vmware tools, giving you the ability to interact with coreos through the vmware api.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Louis

[Louis Parkin]

Hi Maarten

Are you still interested in exploring a customised ISO?

Louis

On Wednesday, October 11, 2017 at 9:19:20 PM UTC+2, Maarten Dekker wrote: