Hi
I have had a windows server 2016 template build working for some time and upgraded to packer 1.6.4 a few months ago when we upgraded to VSphere 7 here with no issues also. In the last few days for some reason I cant quite get to the bottom of, I get the dreaded ‘waiting for ip…’ timeout. On closer inspection, the issue is due to the fact the floppy drives get disconnected right at the start of the unattended installation. I can see the floppy drives attached when the windows installation process starts but fairly soon after they are both disconnected. There are 2 vmware logs created in the datastore (which i suspect is part of the problem) and one of the logs confirms the disconnection of the floppy drives
2021-01-08T16:32:32.960Z| vcpu-0| I005: AIOGNRC: Failed to open ‘/vmfs/volumes/5d3042e8-7f887b56-08b6-0025b511a000/ISO’s/VMWare Tools/11.2.0/pvscsi-Windows8.flp’ : Failed to lock the file (40003) (0x3).
2021-01-08T16:32:32.960Z| vcpu-0| I005: FLOPPYLIB-LIB : Open: FileIO error 4.
2021-01-08T16:32:32.960Z| vcpu-0| I005: FLOPPYLIB-LIB : Open rw for /vmfs/volumes/5d3042e8-7f887b56-08b6-0025b511a000/ISO’s/VMWare Tools/11.2.0/pvscsi-Windows8.flp failed: Device or resource busy
2021-01-08T16:32:36.966Z| vcpu-0| I005: AIOGNRC: Failed to open ‘/vmfs/volumes/5d3042e8-7f887b56-08b6-0025b511a000/ISO’s/VMWare Tools/11.2.0/pvscsi-Windows8.flp’ : Failed to lock the file (40003) (0x1).
2021-01-08T16:32:36.966Z| vcpu-0| I005: FLOPPYLIB-LIB : Open: FileIO error 4.
2021-01-08T16:32:36.966Z| vcpu-0| I005: FLOPPYLIB-LIB : Open r for /vmfs/volumes/5d3042e8-7f887b56-08b6-0025b511a000/ISO’s/VMWare Tools/11.2.0/pvscsi-Windows8.flp failed: Device or resource busy
2021-01-08T16:32:36.966Z| vcpu-0| I005: Msg_Post: Warning
2021-01-08T16:32:36.966Z| vcpu-0| I005: [msg.floppyImage.cantOpen] Cannot open floppy image /vmfs/volumes/5d3042e8-7f887b56-08b6-0025b511a000/ISO’s/VMWare Tools/11.2.0/pvscsi-Windows8.flp: Interrupted system call
2021-01-08T16:32:36.966Z| vcpu-0| I005: ----------------------------------------
2021-01-08T16:32:36.966Z| vcpu-0| I005: Locale_Errno2LocalString: “C” locale found. LC_ALL=(null), LANG=C
2021-01-08T16:32:36.966Z| vcpu-0| I005: Locale_Errno2LocalString: locale(LC_ALL)=C locale(LC_MESSAGES)=C
2021-01-08T16:32:36.968Z| vcpu-0| I005: FLOPPYLIB-IMAGE: Connect error: /vmfs/volumes/5d3042e8-7f887b56-08b6-0025b511a000/ISO’s/VMWare Tools/11.2.0/pvscsi-Windows8.flp will be disconnected.
2021-01-08T16:32:36.968Z| vcpu-0| I005: Msg_Post: Warning
2021-01-08T16:32:36.968Z| vcpu-0| I005: [msg.floppy.connectfailure] Could not connect to floppy “/vmfs/volumes/5d3042e8-7f887b56-08b6-0025b511a000/ISO’s/VMWare Tools/11.2.0/pvscsi-Windows8.flp”. It is being used by another virtual machine or some other program. It will start disconnected.
2021-01-08T16:32:36.968Z| vcpu-0| I005: [msg.device.startdisconnected] Virtual device ‘floppy1’ will start disconnected.
2021-01-08T16:32:36.968Z| vcpu-0| I005: ----------------------------------------
2021-01-08T16:32:40.974Z| vcpu-0| I005: AIOGNRC: Failed to open ‘packer-tmp-created-floppy.flp’ : Failed to lock the file (40003) (0x3).
2021-01-08T16:32:40.974Z| vcpu-0| I005: FLOPPYLIB-LIB : Open: FileIO error 4.
2021-01-08T16:32:40.974Z| vcpu-0| I005: FLOPPYLIB-LIB : Open rw for packer-tmp-created-floppy.flp failed: Device or resource busy
2021-01-08T16:32:44.976Z| vcpu-0| I005: AIOGNRC: Failed to open ‘packer-tmp-created-floppy.flp’ : Failed to lock the file (40003) (0x1).
2021-01-08T16:32:44.976Z| vcpu-0| I005: FLOPPYLIB-LIB : Open: FileIO error 4.
2021-01-08T16:32:44.976Z| vcpu-0| I005: FLOPPYLIB-LIB : Open r for packer-tmp-created-floppy.flp failed: Device or resource busy
2021-01-08T16:32:44.976Z| vcpu-0| I005: Msg_Post: Warning
2021-01-08T16:32:44.976Z| vcpu-0| I005: [msg.floppyImage.cantOpen] Cannot open floppy image packer-tmp-created-floppy.flp: Interrupted system call
2021-01-08T16:32:44.976Z| vcpu-0| I005: ----------------------------------------
2021-01-08T16:32:44.979Z| vcpu-0| I005: FLOPPYLIB-IMAGE: Connect error: packer-tmp-created-floppy.flp will be disconnected.
2021-01-08T16:32:44.979Z| vcpu-0| I005: Msg_Post: Warning
2021-01-08T16:32:44.979Z| vcpu-0| I005: [msg.floppy.connectfailure] Could not connect to floppy “packer-tmp-created-floppy.flp”. It is being used by another virtual machine or some other program. It will start disconnected.
2021-01-08T16:32:44.979Z| vcpu-0| I005: [msg.device.startdisconnected] Virtual device ‘floppy0’ will start disconnected.
As mentioned there are 2 vmware logs in the datastore and the log entries cross over timings which I suspect is the reason why the floppy files are in use
vmware.log 16:55:46.422 - 16:56:24.030
vmware_1.log 16:53:44.134 - 16:56:04.280
My packer config looks like this for info:
"builders": [ { "CPUs": "{{user `vm-cpu-num`}}", "RAM": "{{user `vm-mem-size`}}", "RAM_reserve_all": true, "cluster": "{{user `vsphere-cluster`}}", "communicator": "winrm", "convert_to_template": "true", "datacenter": "{{user `vsphere-datacenter`}}", "datastore": "{{user `vsphere-datastore`}}", "disk_controller_type": "lsilogic-sas", "firmware": "bios", "floppy_files": [ "./scripts/standard/autounattend.xml", "./scripts/install-vm-tools.cmd", "./scripts/disable-winrm.ps1", "./scripts/disable-network-discovery.cmd" ], "floppy_img_path": "[VMWARE-REDACTED-CONTENT-LIBRARY] ISO's/VMWare Tools/11.2.0/pvscsi-Windows8.flp", "folder": "{{user `vsphere-folder`}}", "guest_os_type": "windows9Server64Guest", "host": "{{user `vsphere-host`}}", "insecure_connection": "true", "iso_paths": [ "{{user `os_iso_path`}}", "{{user `vmtools_iso_path`}}" ], "network_adapters": [ { "network": "{{user `vsphere-network`}}", "network_card": "vmxnet3" } ], "notes": "Built via Packer - see code repo ''", "password": "{{user `vsphere-password`}}", "storage": [ { "disk_size": "{{user `vm-disk-size`}}", "disk_thin_provisioned": true } ], "type": "vsphere-iso", "username": "{{user `vsphere-user`}}", "vcenter_server": "{{user `vsphere-server`}}", "vm_name": "{{user `vm-name`}}", "winrm_password": "{{user `winadmin-password`}}", "winrm_username": "Administrator" } ]
I have tried more recent packer versions 165 and 166 and same result. Also tried just one floppy drive instead of 2. The account I’m using for vsphere access is a top level administrator also
Any suggestions greatly appreciated!