Welcome to the Packer guides. If you are just getting started with Packer,
please see the Packer introduction instead and then continue on to the guides.
These guides provide examples for common Packer workflows and actions for
users of Packer.

Guides

The guides stored in this section are miscellanious tips and tricks that might
make your experience of using Packer easier

Tips and Tricks

Workflow Tips and Tricks

It can be a bit confusing to figure out how to format your isotime using the
golang reference date string. Here is a small guide and some examples.

Using the isotime template function - Guides

Isotime Template Function

You can add detailed comments beyond the root-level underscore-prefixed field
supported by Packer, and remove them using jq.

Use jq and Packer to comment your templates - Guides

Use jq to strip comments from a Packer template

If you are or were a user of Veewee, then there is an official tool called
veewee-to-packer that will convert your Veewee definition into an equivalent
Packer template. Even if you're not a Veewee user, Veewee has a large library
of templates that can be readily used with Packer by simply converting them.

Convert Veewee Definitions to Packer Templates - Guides

Veewee to Packer

Build Images in CI/CD

Build a VirtualBox Image with Packer in TeamCity

Build Immutable Infrastructure with Packer in CI/CD

Here we explore how to break your builds into discrete steps so that your
builds can be shorter and more reliable.

Packer Build Pipelines

Pipelineing Builds

Trigger Terraform Enterprise runs

Upload VirtualBox Image to S3

Upload a VirtualBox Image to S3

Learn how to generate the HCL2 configuration of your component easily.

Generating code for config spec.

Making a plugin HCL2 enabled

Learn how to manually move from a Packer v1 working JSON build file to a
working v1.5.0 HCL file.

Transforming Packer v1 files for Packer v1.5.0

From JSON v1

Getting started configuring Packer with HCL2 files

HCL guides

This page introduces input variables and local variables as a way to
parameterize a configuration.

Input and Local Variables guide

Variables

Learn how to use an autounattend file to automatically answer installation
questions and enable Packer to connect to your windows instnace.

Unattended Windows Installation

Unattended Installation for Windows

Learn how to use preseed, kickstart, and autounattend files to automatically
answer installation questions and enable Packer to connect to your instnace.

Automatic OS Installs

Learn how to use a preseed file to automatically answer installation
questions and enable Packer to connect to your Debian instnace.

»Packer