Utilizing local system builders

Packer isn’t always about cloud or remote system images. Sometimes, it’s helpful to build local images for testing or local hypervisors. The build performance in local environments is often better and may save you time when developing. Here, we will cover a few common options for local builds before moving on to cloud images.

Using VirtualBox builders – ISO, OVF, and VM

In addition to the ISO builder, which boots a VirtualBox VM from a read-only ISO image, you may use an existing OVF, or even an existing VM that exists in VirtualBox. The OVF builder is particularly useful as it lets images quickly be built from the OVF output of another Packer build. Let’s explore the options for each of these. Note that if you’re using JSON with the JSON schemas enabled in your editor, these options should be annotated and guided with optional default values. One thing we didn’t cover is configuring the VirtualBox plugin...