Wednesday, June 2, 2010

OVF packages and virtual disk import now native in XenCenter

The latest update of XenServer (5.6) and its GUI management interface XenCenter includes the addition OVF package Import and Export and virtual Disk Image Import courtesy of Citrix Labs in Redmond.

This means that in the XenCenter application there is now the option to Import and / or Export (Create) packages using the OVF standard from the DTMF.

There is also the added feature of Disk Image Import – directly importing a VHD (Microsoft), VMDK (VMware), VDI (VirtualBox) virtual disk or a WIM (Windows IMaging format) disk image into a VM.

The OS Fixup feature from Project Kensho is also included.  This is a basic routine that handles the most common interoperability issues that folks can run into when importing an OVF package to XenServer when the VMs (the operating systems within the VM actually) have been installed on a hypervisor other than XenServer.

This feature is labeled as experimental in XenCenter but I hope that you all find it useful in bringing OVF packages into XenServer and also in producing OVF packages for internal and other purposes.

More later, in both the XenCenter forums and on my blog.

XenServer 5.6 can be downloaded from the Download link (in the top navigation bar) at Citrix.com – you must login with your MyCitrix ID and filter by selecting XenServer to get version 5.6.

Quick demos of the new features here:

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