How to mount a custom ISO to a Virtual Machine

Step-by-step guide with PyVss

This section assumes, you have already set up both VSS_API_USER and VSS_API_USER_PASS environment variables and installed PyVss.

1. Create an instance of VssManager, generate token via get_token, and create an instance of the webdavclient using get_vskey_stor method as follows:

   from pyvss.manager import VssManager
    
   vss = VssManager(None)
   vss.get_token()        # generates token
   vss.get_vskey_stor()   # creates a WebDav Client instance to interact with VSKEY-STOR 

2. Upload the given iso to any given directory or to your home. In this case, we will use the isos folder:

   # upload
   vss.vskey_stor.upload_sync(local_path='~/Downloads/debian-live-8.6.0-amd64-gnome-desktop.iso', 
   						   remote_path='isos/debian-live-8.6.0-amd64-gnome-desktop.iso')
   # check if uploaded
   vss.vskey_stor.info('isos/debian-live-8.6.0-amd64-gnome-desktop.iso')
   {'created': None, 'name': None, 'modified': 'Tue, 01 Nov 2016 13:49:31 GMT', 'size': '1394147328'}

3. Get the path to mount in the Virtual Machine 

    

   isos = vss.get_isos(name='debian-live')
   iso = isos[0].get('path')

4. Get VM and Mount given ISO:

   # get target vm uuid
   vms = vss.get_vms(name='vm-testing')
   uuid = vms[0].get('uuid')
    
   # submit change request
   r = vss.update_vm_cd(uuid=uuid, cd=1, iso=iso)
    
   # wait for request to be processed
   completed = vss.wait_for_request(request_url=r.get('_links').get('request'), request_attr='status', required_status='Processed')

Step-by-step guide with API Calls

Upload ISO to VSKEY-STOR

1. Login to vskey-stor here.

2. Upload the desired iso file  to your account. After uploading you will see the item available in the web interface:
   

Get ISO path

1. With your token make a request to the /iso endpoint filtered by name to get the actual ISO path:

   Request

   http GET "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/iso?name=gnome" "Authorization: Bearer $TK"

   Response Body Expand source

   {
       "_links": {
           "api": "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/",
           "self": "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/iso"
       },
       "data": [
           {
               "name": "debian-live-8.5.0-amd64-gnome-desktop",
               "path": "[vssUser-xfers] jm/debian-live-8.5.0-amd64-gnome-desktop.iso"
           }
       ],
       "meta": {
           "count": 1,
           "time": "1.33549s",
           "user": "jm"
       }
   }

   Save [vssUser-xfers] jm/debian-live-8.5.0-amd64-gnome-desktop.iso string, since you'll need this eventually

Mount the ISO

1. Get virtual machine UUID using the search feature in the /vm resource:

   Request

   http GET "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/vm?name=vm-testing&summary" "Authorization: Bearer $TK"

   Response Body Expand source

   {
       "_links": {
           "api": "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/",
           "self": "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/vm"
       },
       "data": [
           {
               "_links": {
                   "self": "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/vm/<vm_uuid>"
               },
               "name": "1606D-vm-testing",
               "uuid": "<vm_uuid>"
           }
       ],
       "meta": {
           "count": 1,
           "time": "1.13983s",
           "user": "josem"
       }
   }

2. Now, we need to verify CD 1 settings, specifically the backing attribute in the data object which has to be set to "client" by default:

   Request

   http GET "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/vm/<vm_uuid>/cd/1" "Authorization: Bearer $TK"

   Response Body Expand source

   {
       "_links": {
           "self": "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/vm/<vm_uuid>/cd/1",
           "vm": "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/vm/<vm_uuid>/cd"
       },
       "data": [
           {
               "backing": "client",
               "connected": "Disconnected",
               "controller": {
                   "type": "IDE 1",
                   "virtualDeviceNode": "IDE 1:0"
               },
               "description": "Remote device CD-ROM 1",
               "key": 3002,
               "label": "CD/DVD drive 1",
               "unit": 0
           }
       ],
       "meta": {
           "count": 1,
           "time": "0.04656s",
           "user": "jm"
       }
   }

3. To update  CD 1 backend according to the docs, it can be done by making a PUT request to the /vm/<vm_uuid>/cd/1 endpoint with the attribute set to iso and value set to the ISO path, in this case [vssUser-xfers] jm/debian-live-8.5.0-amd64-gnome-desktop.iso

   http PUT "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/vm/<vm_uuid>/cd/1" attribute='iso' value="[vssUser-xfers] jm/debian-live-8.5.0-amd64-gnome-desktop.iso" "Authorization: Bearer $TK"

4. After a few seconds, the ISO file will be mounted and the CD1 would show something like:

   http GET "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/vm/<vm_uuid>/cd/1" "Authorization: Bearer $TK"

   Response Body Expand source

   {
       "_links": {
           "self": "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/vm/<vm_uuid>/cd/1",
           "vm": "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/vm/<vm_uuid>/cd"
       },
       "data": [
           {
               "backing": "[vssUser-xfers] jm/debian-live-8.5.0-amd64-gnome-desktop.iso",
               "connected": "Connected",
               "controller": {
                   "type": "IDE 1",
                   "virtualDeviceNode": "IDE 1:0"
               },
               "description": "ISO [vssUser-xfers] jm/debian-live-8.5.0-amd64-gnome-desktop.iso",
               "key": 3002,
               "label": "CD/DVD drive 1",
               "unit": 0
           }
       ],
       "meta": {
           "count": 1,
           "time": "0.04492s",
           "user": "jm"
       }
   }

Unmount the ISO

1. Once the ISO file is no longer required, you can unmount it by making a PUT request to the same endpoint /vm/<vm_uuid>/cd/1 with attribute set to client and value set to empty.

   http PUT "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/vm/<vm_uuid>/cd/1" "Authorization: Bearer $TK" attribute='client' value=''

2. If the request has been successfully processed, the CD 1 endpoint will show show the following response body:

   http GET "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/vm/<vm_uuid>/cd/1" "Authorization: Bearer $TK"

   Response Body Expand source

   {
       "_links": {
           "self": "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/vm/<vm_uuid>/cd/1",
           "vm": "https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca/v2/vm/<vm_uuid>/cd"
       },
       "data": [
           {
               "backing": "client",
               "connected": "Disconnected",
               "controller": {
                   "type": "IDE 1",
                   "virtualDeviceNode": "IDE 1:0"
               },
               "description": "Remote device",
               "key": 3002,
               "label": "CD/DVD drive 1",
               "unit": 0
           }
       ],
       "meta": {
           "count": 1,
           "time": "0.04782s",
           "user": "jm"
       }
   }

Related articles

• Page:
  How to create and update virtual disks