Release History¶

v0.23.0¶

Release Date: Not Released

Chore:

Updates Debian Linux 12 to 12.10 release. #1031
Updates SLES 15 to 15.6 release. #1030

v0.22.1¶

Release Date: 2025-03-05

Bug Fix:

Fixes issue with config.sh not creating the default or specified configuration path. #1024

v0.22.0¶

Release Date: 2025-02-11

Bug Fix:

Reestablishes an empty GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT as late_command for Ubuntu. #982
Resolves configuration and setup for Python and cloud-init in SUSE Enterprise Linux environments. Added a fallback mechanism for the Python interpreter, removing redundant tasks, and updating package installation and registration. #991

Enhancement:

Adds confirmation before overwriting existing configuration files. #987
Add CentOS Stream 10 to project. #989
Refactors PowerShell script for installation of VMware Tools on Windows. #1011

Chore:

Updates Debian 11 to 11.11 release. #10102
Updates Debian Linux 12 to 12.9 release. #1012
Updates Ubuntu 22.04 LTS to 22.04.5 release. #984
Updates Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 to 9.5 release. #984
Updates AlmaLinux 9 to 9.5 release. #984
Updates Rocky Linux 9 to 9.5 release. #984
Updates Oracle Linux 9 to 9.5 release. #984
Updates Fedora Server to release 41. #984
Updates required_versions for packer to >= 1.12.0. #1013
Updates required_plugins for packer-plugin-vsphere to >= 1.4.2. #986
Updates required_versions for packer-plugin-ansible to >= 1.1.2. #986
Updates required_plugins for ethanmdavidson/packer-plugin-git to >= 0.6.3. #986
Updates required_versions for terraform to >= 1.10.0. #986
Updates required_versions for hashicorp/vsphere to >= 2.11.0. #1013
Updates required_versions for hashicorp/hcp to >= 0.102.0. #1013
Updates Gomplate to >= 4.3.0. #1013

v0.21.0¶

Release Date: 2024-09-26

Bug Fix:

Updates to debian.yml file to remove the disable flag on cloud-init for Ubuntu 24.04 LTS version. #940
Updates to debian.yml file to fix cloud-init install issue and additional package issue. #944
Fixes issue when using http data source with a static IP address and the kickstart file could not be sent from Packer host. #959

Enhancement:

Updates pkr.hcl.example and variables.pkr.hcl with defaults. #944, #945

Chore:

Removes Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 from the project. #944

On 30 June 2024, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 reached the end of life.

Updates Rocky Linux 8.9 to 8.10 release. #944
Updates required_versions for packer to >= 1.11.0. #960
Updates required_plugins for packer-plugin-vsphere to >= 1.4.0. #960
Updates required_versions for terraform to >= 1.9.5. #960
Updates required_versions for terraform-provider-vsphere to >= 2.8.3. #960
Updates required_versions for hashicorp/hcp to >= 0.95.0. #960
Updates required_versions for packer-plugin-ansible to >= 1.1.1. #960
Removes Centos Linux 7 from the project. #960
Updates Debian Linux 12.5 to 12.6 release. #960
Updates Ubuntu 22.04 LTS to 22.04.1 LTS. #965
Updates AlmaLinux Build pkr.hcl file change version from 8.9 to 8.10 #965
Updates Oracle Linux Build pkr.hcl file change version from 8.9 to 8.10 #965

v0.20.0¶

Release Date: 2024-05-29

Bug Fix:

Updates Windows Desktop Enterprise Edition to support the default use of evaluation mode. #908

Note: Professional Edition does not support evaluation mode. Microsoft Evaluation Center only provides support for Enterprise Edition. Please see the FAQ for additional details.

Enhancement:

Adds a download script (./download.sh) and a JSON configuration file (project.json) to assist in the download of the guest operating systems. #874, #877
Refactored the build script (./build.sh) to provide the same experience as the download script. #910
Adds Ubuntu Server 24.04 LTS to the project. #891
Adds Fedora Server 40 Linux distribution to the project. #xxx
Adds option to enable cloud-init on Debian 12. #883
Adds option to enable cloud-init on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9. #888
Adds option to enable cloud-init on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8. #888
Adds option to enable cloud-init on Rocky Linux 9. #895
Adds option to enable cloud-init on Rocky Linux 8. #895
Adds option to enable cloud-init on CentOS Stream 8. #897
Adds option to enable cloud-init on CentOS Stream 9. #897
Adds option to enable cloud-init on AlmaLinux OS 8. #898
Adds option to enable cloud-init on AlmaLinux OS 9. #898
Adds option to enable cloud-init on Oracle Linux 8. #899
Adds option to enable cloud-init on Oracle Linux 9. #899
Adds option to enable cloud-init on VMware Photon OS 4. #900
Adds option to enable cloud-init on VMware Photon OS 5. #900
Adds option to enable cloud-init on SUSE Enterprise Linux 15. #910

Chore:

Updates Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 to 9.4 release. #925
Updates Oracle Linux 9 to 9.4 release. #927
Updates Almalinux 9 to 9.4 release. #927
Updates Rocky Linux 9 to 9.4 release. #927
Removes CentOS Stream 8 from the project.
Updates Almalinux 8.9 to 8.10 release. #956
Updates Oracle Linux 8.9 to 8.10. #956

On 31 May 2024, CentOS Stream 8 reached the end of life.

Removes Ubuntu Server 23.10 from the project; superseded by 24.04 LTS. #891
Updates required_plugins for packer-plugin-vsphere to >= 1.3.0.
Updates required_versions for terraform to >= 1.8.3.
Updates required_versions for hashicorp/vsphere to >= 2.8.1.
Updates required_versions for hashicorp/hcp to >= 0.89.0.
Update ansible-core version from 2.15 to 2.16. #921

v0.19.1¶

Release Date: 2024-04-15

Bug Fix:

Removes the PowerShell provisioner for Windows 11 and 10 as it's not required after the transition to Ansible. #878

v0.19.0¶

Release Date: 2024-04-09

Enhancement:

Adds templates and unit tests for managing custom network and storage configurations for Linux distributions. #473, #805
Adds additional configuration to install packages for Linux distributions. #800
Adds option to set a specified number of remaining CD-ROMs for a machine images added in packer-plugin-vsphere v1.2.4. #836
Adds use of evaluation versions for Windows Server 2025, 2022, and 2019 images, by default. Keys are still supported. #844
Adds use of evaluation versions for Windows 11 and 10 images, by default. Keys are still supported. #844
Adds Windows Server 2025 Insiders Preview. #834
Adds Ansible integration for Windows Server 2025, 2022, and 2019 images. #801
Adds Ansible integration for Windows 11 and 10 images. #801
Adds option to enable a content library to source all guest operating system ISOs or use a datastore path. Defaults to false, disabled. Set common_iso_content_library_enabled to true to enable use of a content library for all guest operating system ISOs.
Adds option to enable a content library for the placement of virtual machine images builds. Defaults to true, enabled. Set common_content_library_enabled to false to disable use of a content library for saving virtual machine image builds.

Refactor:

Refactors the Ubuntu builds not to use cloud-init, by default. ## Set vm_guest_os_cloudinit to true to enable cloud-init on the machine image.

Chore:

Updates required_versions for packer to >= 1.11.0. #828
Updates required_plugins for packer-plugin-vsphere to >= 1.2.7. #824, #871, #873
Updates required_plugins for ethanmdavidson/packer-plugin-git to >= 0.6.2. #868
Updates required_versions for terraform to >= 1.7.1. #829
Updates required_versions for hashicorp/vsphere to >= 2.7.0. #866
Updates required_versions for hashicorp/hcp to >= 0.84.1. #867
Updates Gomplate to 3.11.7. #825
Updates Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 to 9.3 release. #819
Updates Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 to 8.9 release. #818
Updates AlmaLinux 9 to 9.3 release. #817
Updates AlmaLinux 8 to 8.9 release. #817
Updates Rocky Linux 9 to 9.3 release. #823
Updates Rocky Linux 8 to 8.9 release. #822
Updates Oracle Linux 9 to 9.3 release. #821
Updates Oracle Linux 8 to 8.9 release. #820
Updates Debian 12 to 12.5 release. #865
Updates Debian 11 to 11.9 release. #864
Updates Ubuntu 22.04 to 22.04.4 release. #863
Updates AlmaLinux to upgrade the almalinux-release package during the build. #

v0.18.0¶

Release Date: 2023-11-28

Enhancement:

Adds Ubuntu Server 23.10 to the project. #769
Adds support for setting additional options. (vsphere_resource_pool, set_host_for_datastore_uploads, and ip_settle_timeout). #771

Chore:

Updates ansible/ansible.cfg to use scp_extra_args = "-O" by default. See the Ansible documentation. #767
Removes unused files from ansible/. #768
Removes redundant Ansible task for users. #770

v0.17.0¶

Release Date: 2023-10-23

Enhancement:

Adds VMware Photon OS 5.0 to the project. #582
Adds Debian 12 to the project. #584
Adds Oracle Linux 9 to the project. #670
Adds Oracle Linux 8 to the project. #670
Adds Windows 11 Enterprise to the project. #688
Adds Windows 10 Enterprise to the project. #688
Adds the option to configure the following target for builds: #471
a vSphere cluster with Distributed Resource Scheduling enabled. (Default)
an ESXi host in vSphere cluster with Distributed Resource Scheduling disabled. (Override)
an ESXi host not in a vSphere cluster. (Override)
Adds a development container for Visual Studio Code. #700
Adds an example .gitlab.yml file for GitLab CI/CD. #675
Adds a build-ci.tmpl that can be used to create or update the .gitlab-ci.yml file using gomplate. #675
Adds Packer logging settings to set-envvars.sh. #705
Adds a debug option (--debug or -d) to./build.sh to enable debug logging for Packer. #706

Bugfix:

Updates Debian 11 to include build_password in the linux-debian.pkr.hcl configuration file. #653
Updates Debian 11 to ensure /dev/sr1 is not mounted with use of the default http data source. No changes to the disk data source. #686

Chore:

Updates required_versions for packer to >= 1.9.4. #718
Updates required_plugins for packer-plugin-vsphere to >= 1.2.1. #564
Updates required_plugins for ethanmdavidson/packer-plugin-git to >= 0.4.3. #717
Updates required_plugins for rgl/packer-plugin-windows-update to >= 0.14.3. #565
Updates required_versions for terraform to >= 1.6.0. #757
Updates required_versions for hashicorp/vsphere to >= 2.5.1. #758
Updates Gomplate to 3.11.5. #559
Updates ansible-core to 2.15. #573
Updates Debian 11 to 11.8 release. #738
Updates Ubuntu 22.04 to 22.04.3 release. #720
Updates Ubuntu 20.04 to 20.04.6 release. #566
Removes Ubuntu 18.04 from the project. #578

On 31 May 2023, Ubuntu 18.04 LTS reached the end of standard support. See Ubuntu Lifecycle for more information.

Updates Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 to 9.2 release. #576, #587
Updates Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 to 8.8 release. #577
Updates Almalinux 9 to 9.2 release. #569
Updates Almalinux 8 to 8.8 release. #570
Updates Rocky Linux 9 to 9.2 release. #571
Updates Rocky Linux 8 to 8.8 release. #572
Updates CentOS Stream 9 to latest June 2023 release. #567
Updates CentOS Stream 8 to latest June 2023 release. #568
Updates SLES 15 to 15.5 release. #740
Updates Windows Server 2022 to October 2023 (US English) release. #744
Updates Windows 11 22H2 to October 2023 (US English) release. #743
Updates Windows 10 22H2 to October 2023 (US English) release. #742

Refactor:

Removes the use of iso_checksum and iso_checksum_type as they are not needed since the ISOs are not being downloaded by the plugin and are expected to be present and already verified by the user after download. #722
Removes the installation of Chocolatey from the Microsoft Windows guest operating system builds. #586

v0.16.0¶

Release Date: 2023-01-17

Enhancement:

Adds support for disabling password expiration for the local administrator account on localized (non-English) Windows guest operating systems. #334.
Adds support for enabling Remote Desktop on localized (non-English) Windows guest operating systems. #335.
Adds support to allow SSH authentication with RSA keys for Ansible, if necessary. Adds a note related to OpenSSH >= 9.0 in the documentation. #387.

Bugfix:

Fixes missing privileges for the custom role in vSphere that effected the ability to build using disk-based deployment modes and Windows 11 22H2 with vTPM. #295, #339, #340
Updates the URI in user-data.pkrtpl.hcl for Ubuntu 20.04 and 22.04 to remove the country code. This will help to ensure that GeoIP lookup works for all users. #421
Updates the install commands for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 to use the correct EPEL repository version. #440

Documentation:

Updates options to download a release or clone the project. #385
Updates syntax to append RSA algorithm to HostKeyAlgorithms +ssh-rsa andPubKeyAcceptedAlgorithms +ssh-rsa. #386
Updates the ssh-keygen example for generating the ECDSA public key to use a 521 bit key length. Valid key lengths are 256, 384, or 521. #439

Refactor:

Refactors builds to use the current Git branch / tag as the build_version local variable used for virtual machine image names and descriptions. #385
Refactors Ansible roles to remove the warn: false args for ansible-core 2.14 compatibility. #443

Chore:

Updates required_versions for packer to >= 1.8.5. #423
Updates required_plugins for packer-plugin-vsphere to >= 1.1.1. #416
Updates required_versions for terraform to >= 1.3.7. #456
Updates required_versions for hashicorp/hcp to >= 0.51.0. #408, #409, #410, #411, #412, #413, #414, #415
Updates Gomplate to 3.11.3. #380, #382
Updates Debian 11 to 11.6 release. #432
Updates Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 to 9.1 release. #366
Updates Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 to 8.7 release. #365
Updates Rocky Linux 9 to 9.1 release. #381
Updates Rocky Linux 8 to 8.7 release. #368
Updates Almalinux 9 to 9.1 release. #362
Updates Almalinux 8 to 8.7 release. #361
Updates CentOS Stream 9 to latest December 2022 release. #454
Updates CentOS Stream 8 to latest December 2022 release. #453
Updates Windows Server 2022 to December 2022 (US English) release. #452
Updates Windows Server 2019 to November 2022 (US English) release. #373
Updates Windows 11 22H2 to December 2022 (US English) release. #451
Updates Windows 10 22H2 to December 2022 (US English) release. #450
Removes Ubuntu 20.04 LTS (x86_64) and macOS
Big Sur (Intel) as tested operating systems for the Packer host. #393

Breaking Change:

Removes support to use the iso_url variable to download the guest operating system .iso from a URL introduced in #249 due to #343. #435

v0.15.0¶

Release Date: 2022-09-28

Enhancement:

Adds support for disk-based deployment mode for Debian 11. #272.
Adds support for disk-based deployment mode for SLES 15. #276

Bugfix:

Fixes mismatches in source names for Windows Server when only builds for Standard or Datacenter are launched using ./build.sh. #281

Chore:

Updates Debian 11 to 11.5.0 release. #273
Updates Ubuntu 22.04 to 22.04.1 release. #274
Updates Ubuntu 20.04 to 20.04.5 release. #275
Updates SLES 15 to 15.4 release. #287
Updates Windows Server 2022 to September 2022 (US English) release. #282
Updates Windows 11 to 22H2 September 2022 (US English) release. #284
Updates Windows 10 to 21H2 September 2022 (US English) release. #283
Updates required_versions for terraform to >= 1.3.1. #292

v0.14.0¶

Release Date: 2022-08-25

Enhancement:

Adds Debian 11. #195
Adds support for initial configuration and use of the HCP Packer Registry. #236 and #256
Adds support to use the iso_url variable to download the guest operating system .iso from a URL. #249

Breaking Change:

Updates vm_cpu_sockets to vm_cpu_count for CPUs. The value of the sockets is determined by dividing the number of CPUs by the number of cores per socket defined. #253

Chore:

Updates required_versions for packer to >= 1.8.3.
Updates required_plugins for packer-plugin-vsphere to >= 1.0.8.
Updates required_versions for terraform to >= 1.2.8.
Updates Windows Server 2022 to August 2022 (US English) release.
Updates Windows 11 to August 2022 (US English) release.
Updates Windows 10 to August 2022 (US English) release.

Note

HTTP-based deployment only.

v0.13.0¶

Release Date: 2022-07-26

Enhancement:

Adds Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.
Adds CentOS 9 Stream.
Adds Rocky Linux 9.
Adds AlmaLinux OS 9.
Adds SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15. #227.
Adds option for setting the number of video displays and the size for the video memory for both Windows 11 and 10, which is useful for virtual desktop use cases (e.g., Horizon). The ability to set the number of displays was added in v1.0.6 of packer-plugin-vsphere.
Adds a common option to export machine image artifacts (.ovf,.vmdk, and .mf) to an output path.
Removes the default requirement for a trusted root authority certificate to be imported and trusted by each machine image build. This will allow project users to get started more quickly without a pre-requisite.

Refactor:

Refactors builds to use local variables for virtual machine image names and descriptions.
Refactors builds to use local variables for ISO paths and checksums.
Refactors builds to use local variables for manifest data and output path.

Chore:

Updates vSphere to version 7.0.3D or higher to address a known issue with the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 with EFI firmware.
Updates required_plugins for packer-plugin-vsphere to >= 1.0.6.
Updates required_versions for terraform to >= 1.2.5.
Updates Rocky Linux 8 to use other4xLinuxGuest64.
Updates Almalinux 8 to use other4xLinuxGuest64.
Removes the deprecated CentOS 8 option; end-of-life as of December 31, 2021.
Removes the deprecated Windows Server 2016 option; end-of-life as of January 11, 2022.

Note

Supports 15.3 / 15 Service Pack 3.

HTTP-based deployment only. Disk-based deployment planned.

v0.12.0¶

Release Date: 2022-06-27

Chore:

Updates required_versions for packer to >= 1.8.2.
Updates required_plugins for packer-plugin-vsphere to >= 1.0.5.
Updates required_versions for terraform to >= 1.2.3.
Updates required_versions for hashicorp/vsphere to >= 2.2.0.
Updates vSphere to version 7.0.3 or higher.
Updates Windows Server 2022 to June 2022 (US English) release.
Updates Windows 11 to June 2022 (US English) release.
Updates vm_guest_os_type for Windows Server 2022 guest ID to windows2019srvNext_64Guest.

v0.11.0¶

Release Date: 2022-05-31

Chore:

Updates required_plugins for packer-plugin-vsphere to >= 1.0.4.
Updates required_plugins and packer-plugin-windows-update to >= 0.14.1.
Updates required_versions for terraform to >= 1.2.1.
Updates Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 to 8.6 release.
Updates Rocky Linux 8 to 8.6 release.
Updates Almalinux 8 to 8.6 release.
Updates CentOS Stream 8 checksum to latest release.
Updates Windows Server 2022 to April 2022 (US English) release.
Updates Windows 11 to May 2022 (US English) release.
Updates requirements to include VMware Photon OS 4 as a tested operating system.
Updates requirements to include Ubuntu 22.04 as a tested operating system.

v0.10.0¶

Release Date: 2022-04-28

Enhancement:

Adds Ubuntu Server 22.04 LTS (#185)
Adds an option to generate a custom build script. (#188)

🐞 Bugfix:

Updates the Python interpreter for Ansible on AlmaLinux to use /usr/libexec/platform-python. (#182)
Adds the use of build_password to the Linux distributions to ensure use of set-envvars.sh works as expected. (#197)
Updates the SHA256 checksum for the CentOS 7 .iso CentOS-7-x86_64-DVD-2009.iso. (#201)

Chore:

Updates the Windows Server 2022 February 2022 (US English) release. (#192)
Updates the Ubuntu 20.04 LTS to 20.04.4 release. (#184)

v0.9.0¶

Release Date: 2022-03-17

Chore:

Updates required_versions for packer to >= 1.8.0.
Updates required_versions for terraform to >= 1.1.7.
Updates required_versions for hashicorp/vsphere to >= 2.1.1.

v0.8.0¶

Release Date: 2022-02-22

Enhancement:

Updates the configuration of Linux machine images to use the Ansible roles instead of shell scripts.

Chore:

Updates required_versions for packer to >= 1.7.10.
Updates required_versions for terraform to >= 1.1.5.

v0.7.0¶

Release Date: 2022-01-21

Enhancement:

Updates the notes to automatically include the Packer version and a build_version.
Updates the naming for the machine image output and includes a build_version (e.g., linux-photon-4-v22.01).
Updates all Microsoft Windows Server machine image builds to a default of 4096 MB of memory to increase performance during operating system patching.

Chore:

Updates the structure of the subdirectories in builds/.
Updates required_versions for packer to >= 1.7.9.
Updates required_plugins for packer-plugin-vsphere to >= 1.0.3.
Updates required_versions for terraform to >= 1.1.4.
Updates Microsoft Windows 11 Professional to use virtual trusted platform module (vTPM) and removes experimental project support. vTPM is now supported by packer-plugin-vsphere to >= 1.0.3.
Updates VMware Photon OS 4.0 to Revision 2.
Adds configurable data source provisioning for VMware Photon OS 4.0. Revision 2 adds support for secondary devices with kickstart. Edit the common_data_source in common.pkvars.hcl from http to disk. The build will attach an on-demand .iso as the secondary CD-ROM for the kickstart. This is useful for environments that can not use HTTP-based kickstart.
Adds a GitHub Action on pull requests to check code quality using linters.
Updates all of project code to address issues found by the linter(s).

v0.6.0¶

Release Date: 2021-11-09

Enhancement:

Adds support for cloud-init and the [VMware] data source introduced in cloud-init v21.3 for Ubuntu Server 20.04 LTS

Important Note: Uncomment these lines in the script for Ubuntu 20.04 and guest customization will be performed by VMware Tools vs. cloud-init.

# Uncomment below if guest customization will be performed by VMware Tools.
# touch /etc/cloud/cloud.cfg.d/99.disable-network-config.cfg
# echo "network: {config: disabled}" >> /etc/cloud/cloud.cfg.d/99.disable-network-config.cfg

Adds custom disk partitioning for Ubuntu Server 20.04 LTS and Ubuntu Server 18.04 LTS
Updates Ubuntu 18.04 LTS to efi-secure.
Updates all certificates to the PEM-encoded .cer format.
Adds example Terraform plans for deployment testing.
Adds an Ansible playbook example to create a custom role in vSphere for Packer.

v0.5.1¶

Release Date: 2021-10-20

Updates LICENSE and NOTICE to BSD-2.
Updates required_versions for packer to >= 1.7.7.
Updates required_plugins for packer-plugin-vsphere to >= 1.0.2.
Updates Linux distributions to generate new host keys on first-boot.
Adds option to usefloppy_content included in packer-plugin-vsphere releasev1.0.2. Ubuntu Server 18.04 LTS will toggle to use floppy_content from http_content when common_data_source = "disk" is enabled.
Updates VMware Photon OS 4.0 to Revision 1.
Adds Microsoft Windows 11 Professional as experimental until vsphere-iso supports vTPM.
Adds support for skip_import Adds to packer-plugin-vsphere in v1.0.2. When set to true the virtual machine will not be imported into the content library. This is useful for testing/debugging. Defaults to false.

v0.5.0¶

Release Date: 2021-10-11

Adds the config.sh to create config/*.prkvars.hcl (default) files from the examples in builds/.
Adds the option for create >1 set of configuration set by passing an argument to config.sh (e.g. config.sh config/us-west-1) and the pass the configuration set to build.sh (e.g. build.sh config/us-west-1).
Use of the content library is now optional by updating the config/common.pkvars.hcl settings to the following:

common_template_conversion     = true
common_content_library    = null
common_content_library_ovf     = false
common_content_library_destroy = false

Adds support for a SOCKS proxy by editing config/proxy.pkvars.hcl.
Adds the ability to set the IP address to bind the HTTP server by editing the common_http_ip in config/common.pkvars.hcl from null to an IP address on the Packer host:

common_http_ip = "172.16.11.100"

Add configurable data source provisioning for Linux images. By default, HTTP is used for the kickstart. By editing the common_data_source in config/common.pkvars.hcl from http to disk the build will use a disk-based method, such as a .iso as the secondary CD-ROM. This is useful for environments that can not communicate back to the Packer host's HTTP server.

common_data_source = "disk"

Renames all certificates to *.ctr.example and *.pb7.example. Please add your own custom certificates to the directories per the README.md.
Adds the ability for Packer to be run from any directory by including the use of $(path.cwd)/.
Adds the ansible provisioner to Linux builds for base configuration using roles. More updates to follow.
Adds information on least privilege service account using a custom role in vSphere.
Adds a Terraform example for creation of the custom role in vSphere.
Updates manifests to use manifests/ and a JSON output based on the timestamp.
Updates manifests to use include relevant data in the JSON output for the build.
Adds RHEL 7 and CentoOS 7 back to the builds per requests.
Refactors RHEL and RHEL derivative kickstarts templates.
Adds Windows 10 Professional.
Updates PhotonOS to efi-secure.
Updates Ubuntu 20.04 LTS to efi-secure.
Adds vendor provided filename and checksums to the build examples.
Updates CONTRIBUTING.md with the contributor workflow.
Adds headers to various scripts and files, as needed.
Add public keys and specific Terraform files to .gitignore.
Updates issue templates to use forms.
Various bugfixes and code cleanliness.
Bumped Packer to >= 1.7.6.
Thanks to the new contributors: @sestegra, @metabsdm, and @gcblack!

v0.4.1¶

Release Date: 2021-09-16

Refactors issue templates to use GitHub custom issue forms.
Refactors all builds to pass the language, keyboard, and timezone to the configuration files.
Updates the Rocky Linux build to use UEFI; however without secure boot.
Updates the defaults in common.pkvars.hcl to use hardware version 19, which provides the best performance and latest features available in ESXi 7.0 U2. if using a previous release
Refactors all builds with input variable definitions separated into variables.pkr.hcl.
Refactors all builds to use <build>.auto.pkvars.hcl for input variables the and <build>.pkr.hcl for the template configurations, with simplified names for <build>.
Refactors all builds to use ${path.cwd}/output/ as the path for the manifest post-processor.
Adds disclaimers and Updates descriptions in script files.
Updates README.md.

v0.4.0¶

Release Date: 2021-09-07

Adds support for Microsoft Windows Server 2022 machine image builds.
Refactors configuration files to be generated using templates. Reduces the number of files and passes variables into the .pkrtpl.hcl content.
Refactors builds for Linux distributions to use http_content instead of http_directory and http_file.
Refactors builds for Microsoft Windows to use cd_content instead of floppy_files, which allows for use generated configuration files. A Packer compatible .iso command-line tool is required.
Adds disclaimers and Updates descriptions in script files.
Adds NOTICE.
Updates the packer init commands run in build.sh.
Updates MAINTAINERS.md.
Updates CONTRIBUTING.md.
Updates README.md.

v0.3.0¶

Release Date: 2021-08-18

Moves vsphere.pkrvars.hcl and rhsm.pkrvars.hcl to the builds directory.
Isolates variables to simplify updates to common settings with builds/common.pkrvars.hcl.
Refactors all build definitions to use variables and reduce any hard-coded settings.
All machine image build definitions use the the recommended firmware based on the guest operating system and the minimum vSphere release supported by the repository. EFI Secure Boot is enabled for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8, CentoOS Linux/Stream 8, AlmaLinux 8, and Microsoft Windows Server 2019/2016. BIOS is enabled Rocky Linux 8.
Adds the manifest post-provisioner to machine image build definitions.
Moves public keys to variables.
Adds a user for Ansible to Linux machine images with authorized_keys. Uses builds/ansible.pkrvars.hcl. Password is randomized.
Updates the Packer block to all builds with required_versions >= "1.7.4" for Packer.
Adds the required_plugins to the Packer block for all builds to use the vsphere plugin version = ">= 1.0.1".
Updates the Packer block for Windows builds with required_plugins and version = "0.14.0" for the Windows-Update plugin.
All builds automatically run packer init to initialize required plugins before running a build with build.sh.
Updates Microsoft Windows autounattend.xml files to use the attached VMware Tools .iso for PVSCSI driver.
Simplified and reduced the script files used by provisioners.
Patches the script for VMware Photon OS 4 due to an issue performing updates with tdnf.
Patches the script for Ubuntu Server 20.04 LTS to remove cloud-init and remove all netplan configurations before GuestOS customization.
Removes support for VMware Photon OS 3 machine image builds.
Removes support for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 machine image builds.
Removes support for CentOS Linux 7 machine image builds.
Deprecates CentOS Linux 8. Removing in a future update. The CentOS Project has shifted focus from CentOS Linux to CentOS Stream. CentOS Linux 8 EOL: 2021-12-31.
Deprecating Microsoft Windows Server 2016. Removing in a future update. Microsoft Windows Server 2016 EOL: 2022-01-22.
Adds MAINTAINERS.md.
Updates README.md.

v0.2.0¶

Release Date: 2021-07-21

Adds support for VMware Photon OS 4.
Adds support for AlmaLinux 8.
Adds support for Rocky Linux 8.
Adds support for CentOS Stream 8.
Updates to >= vSphere 7.0 U2.
Adds the Packer block to all builds with required_versions >= "1.7.3" for Packer.
Adds the Packer block for Windows builds with required_plugins and version = "0.12.0" for the Windows-Update plugin.

v0.1.0¶

Release Date: 2020-11-26

Initial release.