APPLIANCE-CREATOR(8)

📦
version 011.3 · 4 versions
, in epel 9

💖 APPLIANCE-CREATOR(8) — the appliance-creator girlie's guide 💖

ok so quick intro before we get into it: this is the manual page for appliance-creator, part of Appliance Tools. Think of it as your group chat with the terminal, except this chat builds whole appliance images for you. slay. 🎀

✨ NAME ✨

appliance-creator — creates pre-installed appliance images and meta-data. that's the whole vibe. no cap. 💅

🦋 SYNOPSIS 🦋

appliance-creator [OPTIONS]

🌸 DESCRIPTION 🌸

okay so here's the tea, bestie: appliance-creator creates pre-installed appliance images from kickstart files. and what even are kickstart files? they're the little info bundles that carry all the deets about the packages and configurations that get built into the image. so basically the kickstart file is the blueprint and this tool is the main character that actually makes it happen. ✨

🧚 OPTIONS 🧚

  • -h, --help — shows a help message and then dips out. iconic behavior honestly.

🔥 IMAGE OPTIONS 🔥

these options are the ones that define the appliance image you're creating. this is where you decide what your baby looks like. 🫶

  • -c KSCFG, --config=KSCFG — path to the kickstart config file. this is literally the source of truth, don't skip it.
  • -n NAME, --name=NAME — the name of the appliance image to be created (the default is based on the config name). name your child wisely 💖
  • -f FORMAT, --format=FORMAT — disk format. this will take any input that qemu-img convert will take (raw, qcow2, vmdk, ...). > heads up bestie: not all disk formats will work with all virt technologies. also, raw images are xz compressed, and qcow2 images use compression (unless it's disabled with the --no-compress option. — that's literally how it's written in the source, love that for us 😭).
  • --vmem=VMEM — amount of virtual memory for the appliance, in MB (default: 512).
  • --vcpu=VCPU — number of virtual cpus for the appliance (default: 1).
  • --checksum — generate a checksum for the created appliance. for the girlies who like receipts ✨
  • --no-compress — disables image compression. no compression, no problem.

🎀 SYSTEM DIRECTORY OPTIONS 🎀

these options define the way the created appliance is packaged. yes there are two sections with this same heading in the original, and yes we are keeping both because we don't erase history here. 💅

  • -p PACKAGE, --package=PACKAGE — package format, which will package up the output, disk images and meta into a package. currently only "zip", "zip.64", "tar", "tar.gz", "tar.bz2" are supported. (the default is "none", which is valid and also valid of it.)
  • -i INCLUDE, --include=INCLUDE — path to a file or dir to include in the appliance package. bring your friends 🫶
  • -o OUTDIR, --outdir=OUTDIR — output directory. where the magic lands.

⭐ SYSTEM DIRECTORY OPTIONS (yes, again) ⭐

these ones define the directories used on your system for creating the appliance image. different section, same name, still iconic.

  • -t TMPDIR, --tmpdir=TMPDIR — temporary directory to use (default: /var/tmp).
  • --cache=CACHEDIR — cache directory to use (default: private cache).

💀 Debugging options 💀

these options define extra options for debugging. for when something is giving absolutely nothing and you need to know why 🔍

  • -d, --debug — output debugging information.
  • -v, --verbose — output verbose progress information. watch it cook, step by step.
  • --logfile=FILE — save debug information to FILE. so you can re-read the drama later.

🌈 EXAMPLES 🌈

Appliance Example

appliance-creator \
 -n ThinCrust --config
/usr/share/doc/appliance-tools-%{version}/aos-rawhide.ks \
--cache=/var/tmp/act

look at that line break placement. we don't fix it. we respect it. 🙈

👑 CONTRIBUTORS 👑

Dennis Gilmore, David Huff, Joey Boggs, Bryan kearney, Daniel P. Berrange, and a team of other contributors. shoutout to the whole squad, fr fr 💜

🍓 BUGS 🍓

found a bug? report it directly to BugZilla "http://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/" against the "Fedora" product, and the "appliance-tools" component. please and thank you, the devs will love you for it 🫶

Copyright (C) Fedora Project 2012, and various contributors. This is free software. You may redistribute copies of it under the terms of the GNU General Public License "http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html". There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law. — and we mean it, bestie, no warranty at all, read that part again 😭

🦋 SEE ALSO 🦋

"qemu-img(1)", "virt-image(1)", "virt-image(5)" — go read those too, iykyk ✨

and that's the whole page bestie!! this was appliance-tools 011.3, dated 2025-07-04 — screenshot it, save it, tattoo it, whatever you need. go build something iconic. 💅✨🎀💜

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