Getting Started
Now that you’ve learned about the benefits of deploying software as a virtual appliance, try it out and experience the benefits firsthand.
Set up a virtualized environment
Your virtual appliance will run in a virtualized environment. With VMware, this step is easy—and free. If you don’t already have a VMware virtualization solution installed, download either VMware Player or VMware Server for free to get your virtualization environment up and running in minutes.
Build a Virtual Appliance with VMware Studio
VMware Studio is a virtual appliance authoring tool with robust management features and is available online as a free download. VMware Studio enables software developers and hardware appliance vendors to build customized virtual appliances that can be shipped in industry standard Open Virtualization Format (OVF), a format developed by VMware and other leaders in the virtualization field to enable efficient, flexible, and secure distribution of enterprise software, facilitating the mobility of virtual appliances. Download VMware Studio now.
Validate and List your Virtual Appliance
The VMware Ready Virtual Appliance Program is a validation program designed to ensure the best possible user experience by promoting virtual appliances that are VMware validated and ready to run on virtual environments. Virtual appliances that are validated as VMware Ready must be built using a VMware supported guest operating system, comply with VMware best practices, and adhere to the VMware Ready test matrix. Participation in the VMware Ready Virtual Appliance Program provides developers access to exclusive promotional opportunities and promotes trust with customers who find, evaluate, and purchase virtual appliances. Validate and list your VMware Ready Virtual Appliance now.
Find and download a virtual appliance on the VMware Virtual Appliance Marketplace
Once you have set up your virtualized environment, find a virtual appliance that is interesting to you. To get started, browse the VMware Virtual Appliance Marketplace which is a continuously growing ecosystem of virtual appliances that span the areas of security, content and collaboration, infrastructure, database management, and networking.
After you select the virtual appliance you want to try, click on the appropriate download link (‘Try’ or ‘Buy’ for VMware Ready Virtual Appliances or ‘Download’ for all other virtual appliances) and go to the host site to begin the download process. Typically this will involve downloading a ZIP file.
Download a virtual appliance with ESXi
If you are running VI Client 2.5.0 and later along with ESXi 3.5.0 or ESX "classic" 3.5.0 and later, it is possible to access a list of downloadable virtual appliances for evaluation into an ESXi environment. To access that list of virtual appliances, open your VI client, select "Virtual Appliance" from the file menu, and then select "Import...” A popup screen will appear, select “Import from the VMware Virtual Appliance Marketplace” and click “Next”, you will then be sent to a web page where you can download the appliances.
Install your virtual appliance
Installing your virtual appliance is simple. You can review this tutorial to see a sample of this easy to follow deployment process, which typically follows the steps below:
- Unzip the ZIP file to create the directory for your virtual appliance.
- Review the Read Me or Getting Started file in that directory–Note the default user name and password, plus any other pointers about configuring your appliance during its first boot.
- Double-click the virtual machine settings file, *.vmx, to boot your virtual appliance.
- Follow the directions on screen during the initial boot–typically this involves entering some information, agreeing to the EULA, changing the default password, and navigating to the web interface to complete the configuration.
Your virtual appliance is ready for you to use. Whether it is a complex enterprise application, a new Blog server, a Wiki server, or some other fancy Web 2.0 application, you’ll never need to run through anything more complicated than a basic configuration wizard to get the entire solution up and running!
Browse the VMware Virtual Appliance Marketplace.
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