One of the most common questions our customers ask is ‘How do I upload my own VM images to your platform?’ – here’s a step by step guide.
Step 1 > Have your exported Virtual Machine files ready!
Remember, the StratoGen vCloud Platform will only allow you to upload files in the .OVF format. If you exported your virtual machine in the .OVA format, unfortunately you will need to redo the export process, ensuring you select OVF (Multiple Files option)
Step 2 > Log in to your StratoGen vCloud Director account
Using a supported browser, connect to your URL, as provided by your StratoGen representative at the time of sign up. Enter your username and password to login to your account.
Step 3 > Select the ‘Catalogs’ tab
The initial homepage for your cloud is displayed. Now click on the ‘Catalogs’ tab.
Step 4> Create a new Organization Catalog
To add your OVFs the files into a catalog, you’ll first need to create one. Click on the green‘+’ to add a new catalog:
Give the catalog a name, and step through the Wizard.
Step 5 > Upload OVF Files
One you’ve created your catalog, open it up, click on the upload button and then browse to the location that you exported the VMware Image file to, which in my case was the desktop:
Select ONLY the .ovf file – the export process will have created a couple of other files but you don’t need to worry about these – the import process will pick them up:
Click the ‘upload’ button in the catalogue wizard, and then wait for the import to the catalog to complete:
The time taken to upload the Image will depend on the size, and the speed of your upload connection.
Step 6 > Deploy Virtual Machine from uploaded image
Once the upload has completed we are then able to deploy the .ovf into your vCloud Virtual Datacentre. In my demo account, I already have a couple of vApps set up, so I’m going to add the uploaded VM to one of my existing vApps.
To do this, open up the vApp, and then click on the ‘Add Virtual Machine’ button. The catalog wizard should pop up, defaulting to the catalog that you just created, and you should see your virtual machine in it. Select the VM, then click the ‘Add’ button and then click ‘Next’:
In the next step we need to give the VM a network connection – choose either the Direct Internet Connection for external connectivity, or import into an existing Internal Network structure – if applicable. Once the network has been added, click next through to the end of the wizard, and the VM Image will begin deploying. If I go back to my vApp diagram I can see the uploaded image is now deployed in my vApp alongside the other servers which were there previously:
That’s it! I can now power up the machine, and my VMware Image has been moved from my local cloud onto the StratoGen VMware Hosting platform.
Troubleshooting File Uploads
If you experience issues trying to upload .OVF files, they will most likely be caused by browser incompatibilities or Java related issues.
Browser Compatibility List (Correct for vCloud Director 1.5.1)
This table outlines support for browsers on Microsoft Windows operating systems:
This table outlines support for browsers on Linux operating systems:
Java Version 7 Issues
We have seen various issues with browsers using Java version 7. Typical problems include the ‘browse’ button not working when trying to load the file selector. If you experience a similar issue we recommend that you install and use Java JRE version 6 instead*. It is best to install the 32Bit and 64Bit versions. You can download the latest Java 6 from this URL:
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/downloads/jre-6u32-downloads-1594646.html
*Please check that this won’t impact any existing applications that you already have installed.
So you’ve probably seen the press release already – we’ve launched our vCloud platform in Malaysia. Customer demand in the region is booming , and an Asian presence was the next logical step for StratoGen to augment our global reach. StratoGen VMware hosting is now available in EMEA, USA and Asia, making us one of the few VMware vCloud Powered partners with true global reach.
2012 – StratoGen’s Year in Review
2012 was a very busy year for us here at StratoGen, so I thought I would take some time to reflect on some of the bigger things that we achieved over the last 12 months.
January 2012 – USA vCloud Platform launched in Denver Colorado – due to increasing demand for USA based vCloud hosting, StratoGen decided to launch our service across the pond
June 2012 – StratoGen relocated to new offices at 37 Frederick Place in Brighton. Due to continued successful growth more office space was required to house our UK based sales & support teams, so a new home was found.
July 2012 – StratoGen’s New York office was established at 380 Lexington Avenue to provide local support for our rapidly growing US customer base.
August 2012 – StratoGen attended VMworld San Francisco where we met with key customers, learned about key product developments, had the opportunity for an intimate audience with outgoing CEO Paul Maritz, and even got some sound bites on a video posted on the VMware vCloud Blog!
October 2012 – Stratogen’s New Jersey Datacentre launched – due to increasing demand for our US based vCloud Powered VMware Hosting, we brought online our East Coast facility at the impressive IO New Jersey modular datacentre, which survived the havoc wreaked by Frankenstorm, unlike many Manhattan based facilities including some that we evaluated!
November 2012 - StratoGen Upgrades all vCloud Datacentres to vSphere 5.1 & vCloud Director 5.1 becoming one of the first vCloud Powered providers to offer the great new features of 5.1 including Snapshot capability, Storage Profiles and enhanced networking with the vCloud Networking & Security suite
November 2012 – StratoGen Malaysia Datacentre launched in Kuala Lumpur making StratoGen one of the few VMware vCloud Powered hosting companies with true global coverage.
Looking forward to 2013, we’re excited to be growing the team in our US office, and we’re working hard to grow our well established based of ISV and Managed Service Provider customers.
There’s no question that cloud based services will continue to grow in 2013, as more workloads move to the cloud, and more software vendors look to make the shift from traditional on premise client-server deployments to Software As A Service based offerings. VMware themselves are doing a lot of work in this area with ISV’s to ‘vApp’ their applications to simplify migration onto vCloud VMware hosting environments – ultimately deploying an application needs to become as simple as selecting it from a catalog as far as the end user is concerned.
We’d like to thank all of our existing customers for their continued support of StratoGen in 2013, and look forward to working with many more companies over the coming months to help them with their journey to the cloud.