kmvinoth / ubuntu-18.04-ami-setup-packer

Instructions for ubuntu-18.04-ami-setup-packer

The goal of the repository is to spin up Ubuntu (18.04) server with Docker and Docker-compose for web application development, locally and in the cloud (AWS) using Packer and Vagrant with minimal effort.

Packer is an open source tool for creating identical machine images for multiple platforms from a single source configuration. Vagrant is a tool for building and managing virtual machine environments in a single workflow. With an easy-to-use workflow and focus on automation, Vagrant lowers development environment setup time, increases production parity, and makes the "works on my machine" excuse a relic of the past.

Setting up your local machine

• Install VirtualBox
• Install Vagrant
• Install Packer

Building a box with Packer (local)

• RUN https://github.com/kmvinoth/ubuntu-18.04-ami-setup-packer.git
• Run cd packer-templates
• Run packer build -only=virtualbox-iso ubuntu-18.04-server.json

This will take sometime because .iso file has to be fetched from the internet. If you already have the iso file locally specify the location of the iso file in the iso_urls array in ubuntu-18.04-server.json

Once, packer finished building the artifacts, you will find the .box file in vagrant_vm directory

Spining up the server with Vagrant (local)

• Run cd vagrant_vm
• Run vagrant box add ubuntu-18.04.4-server-amd64.box --name dev-server
• Run vagrant up
• Run vagrant ssh to connect to the server
• Run docker version to check docker installation
• Run docker-compose --version to check docker-compose installation

Spinning up the server and creating AMI on AWS

I have selected eu-central-1 as my region, feel free to change it to any region.

• Run export AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID=YOUR_AWS_ACCESS_KEY
• Run export AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY=YOUR_AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY
• Run packer build -only=amazon-ebs ubuntu-18.04-server.json