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VMware ACE Administrator’s Manual
Creating a Package
After you have created a project and applied policies to the virtual machines in the
project, you create packages to deploy those virtual machines to end users. A package
includes an installer and the additional files needed to install a virtual machine and
the VMware ACE application that runs the virtual machine.
You may deploy a package over a network or on DVD or CD. If you deploy the package
on discs, the first disc of the set includes the autorun files needed to start the installer
automatically when the user inserts the disc in the host computer’s drive.
A wizard guides you through the process of creating a package.
To create a package, take the following steps:
1. Start VMware ACE Manager and open the project you want to use as the basis
for the package.
2. To assure that the package is as compact as possible, defragment and shrink the
virtual disks before you create the package. Take the following actions, in the
order listed:
a. Run a disk defragmentation utility inside the virtual machine to defragment
each virtual disk.
b. Use the VMware Tools control panel to shrink each virtual disk. In a Windows
guest, double-click the VMware Tools icon in the system tray. In a Linux or
FreeBSD guest, run vmware-toolbox. Click the Shrink tab. Select the
virtual disks you want to shrink, then click Prepare to Shrink.
Shrinking disks may take considerable time.
3. Be sure that the virtual machine in the package is configured as you want it, then
be sure it is shut down and powered off.
Note, for example, that if you previewed the virtual machine in the VMware ACE
interface, the virtual machine is affected by any changes you made while you
were previewing it. In addition, when you quit the VMware ACE interface, the
virtual machine is suspended, not shut down and powered off.
If a virtual machine is suspended on one host computer, it cannot be resumed
reliably on a host computer with different hardware. As a result, you must be sure
that a virtual machine is powered off, not just suspended, when you create a
package including that virtual machine.
Also be sure that there is no snapshot for the virtual machine. If a snapshot exists,
remove it (Snapshot > Remove Snapshot) before creating the package.