Feature request: create VHD images for Azure cloud

[pagong]

Azure VM images cannot be created from the k3os-amd64.iso blobs.
According to Microsoft a VHD image should be created first.

The build process for k3OS should be enhanced to build Azure VHDs with packer.

[pagong]

It is possible to run k3os on Azure by using the documented takeover installation method.
See rancher slack for a screen dump.

[leebenson]

the Slack link jumps back to Sep 12th, with no obvious refs to Azure (that I could tell.) A search for "Azure" didn't yield anything, either.

Following the takeover installation docs results in:

losetup: k3os.DGpwPrCF.iso: failed to set up loop device: Permission denied

Curious if anyone has had any success deploying to Azure VMs?

[kucerarichard]

+1 I also want this. I'd rather fiddle with k3os on Azure with my chromebook sitting in my lazyboy recliner rather than physically deal with Raspberry Pi stacks that'll all end up in landfill sooner than my recliner.

[schnerring]

Curious if anyone has had any success deploying to Azure VMs?

Yes, I succeeded running it on Azure. I implemented a linuxkit metadata provider upstream December 2020 to specifically bring Azure support for k3os. I refactored it May 2021 due to Azure metadata API changes, and requested LGTM after. I built a custom k3os image with my linuxkit fork and it works perfectly fine. I could write a small guide for people interested in running k3os with their own fork of linuxkit including Azure (or vmware).

Unfortunately the linuxkit maintainers just stopped giving feedback and completely ignored the PR, even though I explained and documented any changes I made to move it forward. The same is happening with a PR adding vmware support which would address #413 but is also stuck because the maintainers ignore it.

k3os uses version 0.8 of linuxkit which was released over a year ago. I don't think there is a release schedule for linuxkit but could be wrong:

k3os/images/20-progs/Dockerfile

Lines 6 to 12 in 63341b3

	ENV LINUXKIT v0.8
	FROM gobuild as linuxkit
	ENV GO111MODULE off
	RUN git clone https://github.com/linuxkit/linuxkit.git $GOPATH/src/github.com/linuxkit/linuxkit
	WORKDIR $GOPATH/src/github.com/linuxkit/linuxkit/pkg/metadata
	RUN git checkout -b current $LINUXKIT

I don't really know how to move this forward or raise awareness. Forking linuxkit would be possible of course, but probably that's not feasible.