Chapter 6. Creating and uploading a customized RHEL system image to Amazon Web Services by using Insights image builder

Procedure

1. Access Insights image builder.

   The Insights image builder dashboard appears.

2. Click Create image.

   The Create image dialog wizard opens.

3. On the Image output page, complete the following steps:

   1. From the Release list, select the Release that you want to use: for example, choose Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL).

   2. From the Select target environments option, select Amazon Web Services as the target environment.

      Click Next.

4. On the Target Environment - Amazon Web Services page, enter your AWS account ID and click Next.

   You can find your AWS account ID by accessing the option Account on the AWS console.

5. On the Registration page, select the type of registration that you want to use. You can select from these options:

   • Register images with Red Hat: Register and connect image instances, subscriptions and insights with Red Hat. For details on how to embed an activation key and register systems on first boot, see Creating a customized system image with an embed subscription by using Insights image builder.
   • Register image instances only: Register and connect only image instances and subscriptions with Red Hat.
   • Register later: Register the system after the image creation.
6. Click Next.
7. Optional: On the Packages page, add packages to your image. See Adding packages during image creation by using Insights image builder.
8. On the Name image page, enter a name for your image and click Next. If you do not enter a name, you can find the image you created by its UUID.

9. On the Review page, review the details about the image creation and click Create image.

   After you complete the steps in the Create image wizard, the image builder dashboard is displayed.

   Insights image builder starts the compose of a RHEL Amazon Machine Image (AMI) for the x86_64 architecture and uploads it to AWS EC2. Then, it will share the AMI image with the account you specified.

   On the dashboard, you can see details such as the Image UUID, the cloud target environment, the image OS release and the status of the image creation.

   Possible statuses:

   • Pending: the image upload and cloud registration is being processed.
   • In Progress: the image upload and cloud registration is ongoing.
   • Ready: the image upload and cloud registration is completed

   • Failed: the image upload and cloud registration failed.

     Note

     The image build, upload and cloud registration processes can take up to ten minutes to complete.

Procedure

1. Access your AWS account and navigate to Service→EC2.
2. In the upper right menu, verify if you are under the correct region: us-east-1.

3. In the left side menu, under Images, click AMIs.

   The dashboard with the Owned by me images opens.

4. From the dropdown menu, choose Private images.

   You can see the image successfully shared with the AWS account you specified.

Procedure

1. From the list of images, select the image you want to launch.
2. On the top of the panel, click Launch. You are redirected to the Choose an Instance Type window.
3. Choose the instance type according to the resources you need to launch your image. Click Review and Launch.
4. Review your instance launch details. You can edit each section, such as Security, Storage, for example, if you need to make any changes. After you finish the review, click Launch.

5. To launch the instance, you must select a public key to access it.

   Create a new key pair in EC2 and attach it to the new instance.

   1. From the drop-down menu list, select Create a new key pair.
   2. Enter the name to the new key pair. It generates a new key pair.
   3. Click Download Key Pair to save the new key pair on your local system.

6. Then, you can click Launch Instance to launch your instance.

   You can check the status of the instance, it shows as Initializing.

7. After the instance status is running, the Connect button turns available.

8. Click Connect. A popup window appears with instructions on how to connect by using SSH.

   1. Select the preferred connection method to A standalone SSH client and open a terminal.

   2. In the location you store your private key, make sure that your key is publicly viewable for SSH to work. To do so, run the command:

      $ chmod 400 <your-instance-name.pem>

   3. Connect to your instance by using its Public DNS:

      $ ssh -i "<_your-instance-name.pem_> ec2-user@<_your-instance-IP-address_>"

   4. Type yes to confirm that you want to continue connecting.

Procedure

1. From the list of Public images, select the image you want to copy.
2. On the top of the panel, click Actions.
3. From the dropdown menu, choose Copy AMI. A popup window appears.

4. Choose the Destination region and click Copy AMI.

   After the copying process is complete, you are provided with the new AMI ID. You can launch a new instance in the new region. See Launching your customized RHEL system image for AWS from your AWS EC2

   Note

   When you copy an image to a different region, it results in a separate and new AMI in the destination region, with a unique AMI ID.

Procedure

1. From the Image Builder table, select the AWS image you want to upload to a different region.

2. From the Node options icon (⫶), select Share to new region. A Share to new region wizard opens.

   1. From the Select region dropdown menu, choose the region or regions to upload your image. Click Share.

Verification

1. Click the Node options icon (⫶) and select an AWS region to start the image.
2. The Image Builder table shows the image or images build status that you shared to the new region or regions.