Powershell scripts for fast Linux VM provisioning

Features

Provision Linux VM using cloud-init on Hyper-V in a single command
Use custom userdata yaml, check cloud-init documentation
Using Ubuntu Cloud Images certified for Azure and proven to work reliably on Hyper-V with tailored Microsoft kernel included
Generation 1 for Azure migration friendliness or Generation 2 Hyper-V virtual machine type supported
Automatic update check for a newer image on provisioning
Works on Windows 10, Hyper-V 2016 or later

Example usage

.\New-HyperVCloudImageVM.ps1 -VMProcessorCount 2 -VMMemoryStartupBytes 2GB -VHDSizeBytes 60GB -VMName "ubuntu-1" -ImageVersion "24.04" -VMGeneration 2 -ShowSerialConsoleWindow -KeyboardLayout en -ShowVmConnectWindow -VMMachine_StoragePath "$env:ProgramData\hyperv-vm-provisioning"

Parameter ImageVersion accepts the following values:

Ubuntu: "18.04", "20.04", "22.04", "22.04-azure", "24.04", "24.04-azure"
Debian: "10", "11", "12"

Remark/Disclaimer: Azure image types by default supports DataSourceAzure cloud-init type which expects Azure environment. Since we are not emulating Azure cloud-init environment the only way to use those images is to converting those images to NoCloud datasource - this requires at least Windows 11 build 22000 because it uses wsl --mount (see Convert-VHDToNoCloud.ps1).

Default username is admin and password is Passw0rd (easily overriden with script parameters). Use standard parameters as needed: unattended use -Force, get some additional details -Verbose or to make initial checkpoint for VM use -Debug.

You should provide your own custom userdata.yaml as script parameter and customize the final image.

Prerequisites

If you have fresh Windows installation please configure Hyper-V first.

Make sure you have Hyper-V services enabled (run windows powershell as admin)

Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName Microsoft-Hyper-V -All

Add Hyper-V management tools

Enable-WindowsOptionalFeature -Online -FeatureName Microsoft-Hyper-V-Tools-All -All

Set up WSL if you plan to use Azure images (source)

wsl.exe --install
wsl.exe --install --no-distribution

Download

One line powershell command

Set-ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Scope Process -Force; [System.Net.ServicePointManager]::SecurityProtocol = [System.Net.ServicePointManager]::SecurityProtocol -bor 3072; $r='hyperv-vm-provisioning'; iwr -Uri 'https://github.com/schtritoff/hyperv-vm-provisioning/archive/master.zip' -UseBasicParsing -OutFile "$r.zip" ; Expand-Archive "$r.zip" -Force ; Remove-Item "$r.zip" -Force

Troubleshooting

If you get error ERROR Daemon /proc/net/route contains no routes on serial console then you need to check if your VM has got and IP address - that is requirement for provisioning to work properly. You need to reboot VM after adding IP to finish with provisioning.

If you had download, extracting or image conversion interruptions/failures try to clear cache folder and try again. It could be that local cache files are in dirty state.

If in serial console you get messages 'Kernel panic - not syncing: VFS: Unable to mount root fs' you might have set too small VHD size. It is recommended to be at least 40 GB for recent Ubuntu Azure images.