PACKER(1)

💖 PACKER(1) 💖

okay bestie, sit down, hydrate, because we're talking about packer — the manual page, the legend, the moment. ✨

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🌸 NAME 🌸

packer — a tool for creating machine images for multiple platforms. that's it, that's the whole vibe, and it's iconic. 💅

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✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

$ packer <command> [<options>] <args>

$ packer build -only=amazon-ebs template.json

like, you give it a command, you give it some options, you give it args, and it goes. 🦋

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🎀 DESCRIPTION 🎀

so basically, Packer is a CLI tool that automatically creates identical machine images for you. and what even is a machine image? it's a single deployable unit that contains a pre-configured OS plus all the software already installed. yes ma'am, fully ready to go. 👑

and it doesn't just do this for one place — it does it for multiple platforms: public cloud providers, private cloud, and desktop virtualization solutions. all from one single JSON template configuration file. one template, many platforms. it's giving efficiency, it's giving main character energy. 🌈

now, if you want the actual docs — especially on how to write proper Packer templates (iykyk, that's the real homework) — go look here:

<https://www.packer.io/docs>

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👑 COMMANDS 👑

• build — build image(s) from a template. for the full list of options that belong to this command, just run: $ packer build -h. 🛠️
• fix — fixes templates from old versions of Packer, like this: $ packer fix old.json > new.json. for the full list of fixes this command performs, plus any special options, see the output of: $ packer fix -h. 💖
• inspect — prints the components of a template. lowkey important detail: this command validates the basic syntax of the template by necessity, but not whether the configuration is actually valid — that's a whole different job, and it belongs to the validate command. don't mix them up bestie. 🙈
• validate — checks if a template is valid. it returns a zero exit status if the template is valid, and a non-zero exit status if it isn't. and if you pass -syntax-only as an option, then only the syntax of the template gets checked. simple as that. ✅
• version — prints the Packer version. that's it, that's the whole thing, and honestly? we love a short king. ⭐

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🔥 LOGGING 🔥

want a build log? of course you do, receipts are everything. run packer like this:

$ PACKER_LOG=1 packer build foo.json 2>>build.log

or, alternatively, use $PACKER_LOG_PATH. pick your fighter. 💀

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🌺 ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES 🌺

for the full list of available environment variables, go here:

<https://www.packer.io/docs/other/environmental-variables.html>

(no cap, there's a whole list waiting for you.) 🧚

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💜 AUTHORS 💜

HashiCorp's Packer is developed by:

• Mitchell Hashimoto <mitchell.hashimoto@gmail.com>
• Jack Pearkes <jackpearkes@gmail.com>
• Mark Peek
• Ross Smith II <ross@smithii.com>
• Rickard von Essen <rickard.von.essen@gmail.com>

and this manpage? written by Daniel Stender <stender@debian.org> for the Debian Go packaging team. absolute serve. 🫶

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and that's the whole page bestie, every last crumb of it. no details skipped, no flags dropped, we ate and left no crumbs. 🍓

PACKER(1) — yeah, the manual page is literally named after the tool, and the source is packer itself. consider this your cute little sign-off: stay validated, keep your exit status at zero, and go build something iconic. ✨💖🎀🦋