Builds hang when floppy attached on ESXi 6.5

[gbuktenica]

Environment:

ESXi = 6.5 update 1
vCenter = vcsa 6.5 update 2
Guest = Windows Server 2016

Steps to reproduce

• Clone windows example
• Update ISO
• Add "cluster" to builder
• Add "network" to builder
• Run:

packer build windows-10.json

Result

• Build hangs at vsphere-io: waiting for IP...
• Guest has a black screen with a single non blinking cursor.

Removing floppy_files section and re-running results in Windows booting to the language section but then there is no way to run the autounattend.xml

[mkuzmin]

try to add "boot_order": "disk,cdrom" parameter

[gbuktenica]

Interesting, now it hangs at:
Setup is starting

[jcoconnor]

Umm - deleted comment earlier re not seeing disk drivers - turned out that I was using a corrupted .iso file. Have a few more questions on this but will raise them through a separate issue.
Fwiw - setup is starting, but barfing on the autounattend file which is more likely a configuration error on my part :)

[schmandforke]

the subject of the ticket describes exactly what i'm not able by now....

My Environment:
vSphere 6.5.0.13000 (VCSA)
ESXi 6.5
Packer v1.2.3 (in docker container)
vsphere-iso packer plugin 2.0

My Config:

{
  "builders": [
    {
      "type": "vsphere-iso",

      "vcenter_server": "10.10.10.10",
      "insecure_connection": "true",
      "vm_version": 13,

      "username": "xxxxx",
      "password": "yyyyy",

      "cluster": "cl01",
      "host": "host21.local",
      "datastore": "Datastore_0000",
      "network": "PROVISION-123",

      "vm_name":  "AutoBuildTemplate01",
      "guest_os_type": "windows7Server64Guest",
      "convert_to_template": "true",
      "folder": "Templates",

      "communicator": "winrm",
      "winrm_username": "user01",
      "winrm_password": "p4ssw0rd",

      "CPUs": 2,
      "RAM": 4096,
      "RAM_reserve_all": true,

      "disk_controller_type":  "pvscsi",
      "disk_size":        61440,
      "disk_thin_provisioned": false,

      "network_card": "vmxnet3",

      "iso_paths": [
        "[Datastore_0000] isos/en_windows_10_multi-edition_vl_version_1709_updated_dec_2017_x64_dvd_100406172.iso"
      ],

      "floppy_files": [
        "/root/unattend/2012r2.xml"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "provisioners": [
    {
      "type": "windows-shell",
      "inline": ["dir c:\\"]
    }
  ]
}

And the logs i get:

$ PACKER_LOG=1 packer build -on-error=abort -parallel=false  win2k8r2.json
2018/05/30 15:07:28 [INFO] Packer version: 1.2.3
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Packer Target OS/Arch: linux amd64
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Built with Go Version: go1.10.1
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Detected home directory from env var: /root
2018/05/30 15:07:28 [DEBUG] Discovered plugin: vsphere-iso = /root/.packer.d/plugins/packer-builder-vsphere-iso
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Using internal plugin for alicloud-ecs
...
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Detected home directory from env var: /root
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Setting cache directory: /root/packer_cache
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Detected home directory from env var: /root
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Loading builder: vsphere-iso
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Creating plugin client for path: /root/.packer.d/plugins/packer-builder-vsphere-iso
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Starting plugin: /root/.packer.d/plugins/packer-builder-vsphere-iso []string{"/root/.packer.d/plugins/packer-builder-vsphere-iso"}
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Waiting for RPC address for: /root/.packer.d/plugins/packer-builder-vsphere-iso
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer-builder-vsphere-iso: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Plugin minimum port: 10000
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer-builder-vsphere-iso: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Plugin maximum port: 25000
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer-builder-vsphere-iso: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Plugin address: unix /tmp/packer-plugin825943872
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer-builder-vsphere-iso: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Waiting for connection...
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer-builder-vsphere-iso: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Serving a plugin connection...
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Loading provisioner: windows-shell
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Plugin could not be found. Checking same directory as executable.
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Current exe path: /bin/packer
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Creating plugin client for path: /bin/packer
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Starting plugin: /bin/packer []string{"/bin/packer", "plugin", "packer-provisioner-windows-shell"}
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Waiting for RPC address for: /bin/packer
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 [INFO] Packer version: 1.2.3
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Packer Target OS/Arch: linux amd64
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Built with Go Version: go1.10.1
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Detected home directory from env var: /root
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Attempting to open config file: /root/.packerconfig
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 [WARN] Config file doesn't exist: /root/.packerconfig
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Packer config: &{DisableCheckpoint:false DisableCheckpointSignature:false PluginMinPort:10000 PluginMaxPort:25000 Builders:map[] PostProcessors:map[] Provisioners:map[]}
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Detected home directory from env var: /root
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Setting cache directory: /root/packer_cache
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Detected home directory from env var: /root
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 args: []string{"packer-provisioner-windows-shell"}
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Plugin minimum port: 10000
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Plugin maximum port: 25000
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Plugin address: unix /tmp/packer-plugin339202557
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Waiting for connection...
2018/05/30 15:07:28 packer: 2018/05/30 15:07:28 Serving a plugin connection...
vsphere-iso output will be in this color.

2018/05/30 15:07:28 ui: vsphere-iso output will be in this color.
2018/05/30 15:07:28 ui:
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Build debug mode: false
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Force build: false
2018/05/30 15:07:28 On error: abort
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Preparing build: vsphere-iso
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Parallelization disabled, waiting for build to finish: vsphere-iso
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Starting build run: vsphere-iso
2018/05/30 15:07:28 Running builder: vsphere-iso
2018/05/30 15:07:28 [INFO] (telemetry) Starting builder vsphere-iso
2018/05/30 15:07:28 ui: ==> vsphere-iso: Creating VM...
==> vsphere-iso: Creating VM...
2018/05/30 15:07:31 ui: ==> vsphere-iso: Customizing hardware...
==> vsphere-iso: Customizing hardware...
2018/05/30 15:07:33 ui: ==> vsphere-iso: Adding CD-ROM drives...
==> vsphere-iso: Adding CD-ROM drives...
==> vsphere-iso: Creating floppy disk...
2018/05/30 15:07:35 ui: ==> vsphere-iso: Creating floppy disk...
2018/05/30 15:07:35 packer-builder-vsphere-iso: 2018/05/30 15:07:35 Floppy path: /tmp/packer385864607
2018/05/30 15:07:35 packer-builder-vsphere-iso: 2018/05/30 15:07:35 Initializing block device backed by temporary file
2018/05/30 15:07:35 packer-builder-vsphere-iso: 2018/05/30 15:07:35 Formatting the block device with a FAT filesystem...
2018/05/30 15:07:35 packer-builder-vsphere-iso: 2018/05/30 15:07:35 Initializing FAT filesystem on block device
2018/05/30 15:07:35 packer-builder-vsphere-iso: 2018/05/30 15:07:35 Reading the root directory from the filesystem
2018/05/30 15:07:35 ui:     vsphere-iso: Copying files flatly from floppy_files
    vsphere-iso: Copying files flatly from floppy_files
    vsphere-iso: Copying file: /root/unattend/2012r2.xml
2018/05/30 15:07:35 ui:     vsphere-iso: Copying file: /root/unattend/2012r2.xml
2018/05/30 15:07:35 ui:     vsphere-iso: Done copying files from floppy_files
    vsphere-iso: Done copying files from floppy_files
2018/05/30 15:07:35 ui:     vsphere-iso: Collecting paths from floppy_dirs
    vsphere-iso: Collecting paths from floppy_dirs
2018/05/30 15:07:35 ui:     vsphere-iso: Resulting paths from floppy_dirs : []
    vsphere-iso: Resulting paths from floppy_dirs : []
2018/05/30 15:07:35 ui:     vsphere-iso: Done copying paths from floppy_dirs
    vsphere-iso: Done copying paths from floppy_dirs
2018/05/30 15:07:35 ui: ==> vsphere-iso: Uploading created floppy image
==> vsphere-iso: Uploading created floppy image
==> vsphere-iso: Step "StepAddFloppy" failed, aborting...
2018/05/30 15:07:35 ui error: ==> vsphere-iso: Step "StepAddFloppy" failed, aborting...
2018/05/30 15:07:35 [INFO] (telemetry) ending vsphere-iso
2018/05/30 15:07:35 ui error: Build 'vsphere-iso' errored: unexpected EOF
2018/05/30 15:07:35 Waiting on builds to complete...
2018/05/30 15:07:35 Builds completed. Waiting on interrupt barrier...
2018/05/30 15:07:35 machine readable: error-count []string{"1"}
2018/05/30 15:07:35 ui error:
==> Some builds didn't complete successfully and had errors:
2018/05/30 15:07:35 machine readable: vsphere-iso,error []string{"unexpected EOF"}
2018/05/30 15:07:35 ui error: --> vsphere-iso: unexpected EOF
2018/05/30 15:07:35 ui:
==> Builds finished but no artifacts were created.
2018/05/30 15:07:35 [INFO] (telemetry) Finalizing.
Build 'vsphere-iso' errored: unexpected EOF

==> Some builds didn't complete successfully and had errors:
--> vsphere-iso: unexpected EOF

==> Builds finished but no artifacts were created.
2018/05/30 15:07:35 /root/.packer.d/plugins/packer-builder-vsphere-iso: plugin process exited
2018/05/30 15:07:36 waiting for all plugin processes to complete...
2018/05/30 15:07:36 /bin/packer: plugin process exited

I think the error during the upload is something about here:

packer-builder-vsphere/iso/step_add_floppy.go

Line 36 in 8754ddc

vmDir, err := vm.GetDir()

Can somebody give me a hint ?

Thanks

[pgiuliano]

I believe I'm having same issue as @gbuktenica - shortly after the new VM boots it goes unresponsive. If you simply restart the VM the build starts and does not stop. I am using vsphere 6.0 U3 building windows server 2016 with a floppy attached for the autounattend.xml - however I have same issue if I don't attach any floppy disc. I suspect it is a vcenter issue (waiting on my virt team to help setup another environment to confirm)

[schmandforke]

Hey @ALL,

my first comment was a failure in vsphere with some certificates. As i'm solving it, i got the issue with "Setup is starting" and the hole vm hang's. Even halting or deleting the VM results in error messages :-S

But... i think it has to be something with the boot_order.

Normal steps which results in errors:

1. • build new VM
2. • attach ISO
3. • attach flp-file
4. • poweron VM

but if i'm going ahead with theese steps, the Setup is running through:

1. • Change BootDelay to 5000 miliseconds
2. • poweron vm
3. • in bootup screen press ESC
4. • choose CDROM Drive

I'm going a step ahead of the "Setup is starting", but failes in the next which say:

Windows could not apply the unattend answer file's <DiskConfiguration> section

pretty weired because, as i said, if i'm doing it all manually, all things working fine...

[Outek]

I have the same issue, none of the Workarounds can fix the unresponsive vm

[xenithorb]

This is likely a duplicate of #119

Possible workaround for this ticket here: #119 (comment)

[Outek]

Thank you, it's working now with this Workaround.

[pgiuliano]

Yep confirmed setting CPU Limit: -1 fixes hang......how did we not see this

[mkuzmin]

fixed in version 2.0.1