A Stemcell is a VM template with an embedded bosh agent. They are the base image for new VMs. That is, on AWS they are the AMI.
Stemcells are large. 400Mb or more. So, run all the following commands from within your BOSH VM where it will be much faster to download and upload the stemcell to your BOSH.
$ ssh ubuntu@ec2-10-2-3-4.compute-1.amazonaws.com
sudo su -
gem install bosh_cli
bosh target localhost:25555
bosh public stemcells
+-------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| Name | Url | +-------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------+
| bosh-stemcell-0.4.7.tgz | https://blob.cfblob.com/rest/objects/4e4e78bc...... |
| bosh-stemcell-aws-0.5.1.tgz | https://blob.cfblob.com/rest/objects/4e4e78bca..... |
+-------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------+
You want the latest public AWS stemcell. Download it from the public server and then upload it to your BOSH:
$ cd /tmp
$ bosh download public stemcell bosh-stemcell-aws-0.5.1.tgz
bosh-stemcell: 98% |ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo | 384.0MB 1.7MB/s ETA: 00:00:03
$ bosh upload stemcell bosh-stemcell-aws-0.5.1.tgz
Verifying stemcell...
File exists and readable OK
Manifest not found in cache, verifying tarball...
Extract tarball OK
Manifest exists OK
Stemcell image file OK
Writing manifest to cache...
Stemcell properties OK
Stemcell info
-------------
Name: bosh-stemcell
Version: 0.5.1
Checking if stemcell already exists...
No
Uploading stemcell...
bosh-stemcell: 100% |ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo | 389.4MB 37.7MB/s Time: 00:00:10
Tracking task output for task#3...
Update stemcell
extracting stemcell archive (00:00:06)
verifying stemcell manifest (00:00:00)
checking if this stemcell already exists (00:00:00)
uploading stemcell bosh-stemcell/0.5.1 to the cloud (00:06:24)
save stemcell: bosh-stemcell/0.5.1 (ami-a213cbcb) (00:00:00)
Done 5/5 00:06:30
Task 3: state is 'done', took 00:06:30 to complete
Stemcell uploaded and created
If you look in AWS console, you'll see an AMI created!
BOSH knows about your uploaded stemcell (an AMI on AWS):
$ bosh stemcells
+---------------+---------+--------------+
| Name | Version | CID |
+---------------+---------+--------------+
| bosh-stemcell | 0.5.1 | ami-a213cbcb |
+---------------+---------+--------------+