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Creating a custom default profile is a good way to streamline a Windows 10 deployment. How do you achieve this? Note:-this article refers to the default profile creation process on Windows 10 version 1803, fully patched as of. This blog post is a complete SCCM Windows 10 Deployment Guide. It contains all you need to know for a successful Windows 10 Deployment. The race to update Windows 7 computers from your environment is entering its home stretch. If I skip the first few steps and only follow part 3 to create an unattend.xml file, place that in the sysprep folder on my vm. Sysprep with generalize and oobe and shut down, take a snapshot, then save the image to a usb drive with clonezilla, would I then be able to restore that image to workstations and have it skip through oobe?

Azure Image Builder uses a .json file to pass information into the Image Builder service. In this article we will go over the sections of the json file, so you can build your own. To see examples of full .json files, see the Azure Image Builder GitHub.

This is the basic template format:

Type and API version

The type is the resource type, which must be 'Microsoft.VirtualMachineImages/imageTemplates'. The apiVersion will change over time as the API changes, but should be '2020-02-14' for preview.

Location

The location is the region where the custom image will be created. For the Image Builder preview, the following regions are supported:

• East US
• East US 2
• West Central US
• West US
• West US 2
• South Central US
• North Europe
• West Europe
• South East Asia
• Australia Southeast
• Australia East
• UK South
• UK West

Data Residency

The Azure VM Image Builder service doesn't store/process customer data outside regions that have strict single region data residency requirements when a customer requests a build in that region. In the event of a service outage for regions that have data residency requirements, you will need to create templates in a different region and geography.

Zone Redundancy

Distribution supports zone redundancy, VHDs are distributed to a Zone Redundant Storage account by default and the Shared Image Gallery version will support a ZRS storage type if specified.

vmProfile

buildVM

By default Image Builder will use a 'Standard_D1_v2' build VM, this is built from the image you specify in the source. You can override this and may wish to do this for these reasons:

1. Performing customizations that require increased memory, CPU and handling large files (GBs).
2. Running Windows builds, you should use 'Standard_D2_v2' or equivalent VM size.
3. Require VM isolation.
4. Customize an Image that require specific hardware, e.g. for a GPU VM, you need a GPU VM size.
5. Require end to end encryption at rest of the build VM, you need to specify the support build VM size that don't use local temporary disks.

This is optional.

Proxy VM Size

The proxy VM is used to send commands between the Azure Image Builder Service and the build VM, this is only deployed when specifying an existing VNET, for more details review the networking options documentation.

This is optional.

osDiskSizeGB

By default, Image Builder will not change the size of the image, it will use the size from the source image. You can only increase the size of the OS Disk (Win and Linux), this is optional, and a value of 0 means leave the same size as the source image. You cannot reduce the OS Disk size to smaller than the size from the source image.

vnetConfig

If you do not specify any VNET properties, then Image Builder will create its own VNET, Public IP, and NSG. The Public IP is used for the service to communicate with the build VM, however if you do not want a Public IP or want Image Builder to have access to your existing VNET resources, such as configuration servers (DSC, Chef, Puppet, Ansible), file shares etc., then you can specify a VNET. For more information, review the networking documentation, this is optional.

Tags

These are key/value pairs you can specify for the image that's generated.

Depends on (optional)

This optional section can be used to ensure that dependencies are completed before proceeding.

For more information, see Define resource dependencies.

Identity

Required - For Image Builder to have permissions to read/write images, read in scripts from Azure Storage you must create an Azure User-Assigned Identity, that has permissions to the individual resources. For details on how Image Builder permissions work, and relevant steps, please review the documentation.

Image Builder support for a User-Assigned Identity:

• Supports a single identity only
• Does not support custom domain names

To learn more, see What is managed identities for Azure resources?.For more information on deploying this feature, see Configure managed identities for Azure resources on an Azure VM using Azure CLI.

Properties: source

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The source section contains information about the source image that will be used by Image Builder. Image Builder currently only natively supports creating Hyper-V generation (Gen1) 1 images to the Azure Shared Image Gallery (SIG) or Managed Image. If you want to create Gen2 images, then you need to use a source Gen2 image, and distribute to VHD. After, you will then need to create a Managed Image from the VHD, and inject it into the SIG as a Gen2 image.

The API requires a 'SourceType' that defines the source for the image build, currently there are three types:

• PlatformImage - indicated the source image is a Marketplace image.
• ManagedImage - use this when starting from a regular managed image.
• SharedImageVersion - this is used when you are using an image version in a Shared Image Gallery as the source.

Note

When using existing Windows custom images, you can run the Sysprep command up to 3 times on a single Windows 7 or Windows Server 2008 R2 image, or 1001 times on a single Windows image for later versions; for more information, see the sysprep documentation.

PlatformImage source

Azure Image Builder supports Windows Server and client, and Linux Azure Marketplace images, see here for the full list.

The properties here are the same that are used to create VM's, using AZ CLI, run the below to get the properties:

You can use 'latest' in the version, the version is evaluated when the image build takes place, not when the template is submitted. If you use this functionality with the Shared Image Gallery destination, you can avoid resubmitting the template, and rerun the image build at intervals, so your images are recreated from the most recent images.

Support for Market Place Plan Information

You can also specify plan information, for example:

ManagedImage source

Sets the source image as an existing managed image of a generalized VHD or VM.

Note

The source managed image must be of a supported OS and the image must same region as your Azure Image Builder template.

The imageId should be the ResourceId of the managed image. Use az image list to list available images.

SharedImageVersion source

Sets the source image an existing image version in a Shared Image Gallery.

Note

The source managed image must be of a supported OS and the image must same region as your Azure Image Builder template, if not, please replicate the image version to the Image Builder Template region.

The imageVersionId should be the ResourceId of the image version. Use az sig image-version list to list image versions.

Properties: buildTimeoutInMinutes

By default, the Image Builder will run for 240 minutes. After that, it will timeout and stop, whether or not the image build is complete. If the timeout is hit, you will see an error similar to this:

If you do not specify a buildTimeoutInMinutes value, or set it to 0, this will use the default value. You can increase or decrease the value, up to the maximum of 960mins (16hrs). For Windows, we do not recommend setting this below 60 minutes. If you find you are hitting the timeout, review the logs, to see if the customization step is waiting on something like user input.

If you find you need more time for customizations to complete, set this to what you think you need, with a little overhead. But, do not set it too high because you might have to wait for it to timeout before seeing an error.

Properties: customize

Image Builder supports multiple ‘customizers’. Customizers are functions that are used to customize your image, such as running scripts, or rebooting servers.

When using customize:

• You can use multiple customizers, but they must have a unique name.
• Customizers execute in the order specified in the template.
• If one customizer fails, then the whole customization component will fail and report back an error.
• It is strongly advised you test the script thoroughly before using it in a template. Debugging the script on your own VM will be easier.
• Do not put sensitive data in the scripts.
• The script locations need to be publicly accessible, unless you are using MSI.

The customize section is an array. Azure Image Builder will run through the customizers in sequential order. Any failure in any customizer will fail the build process.

Note

Inline commands can be viewed in the image template definition and by Microsoft Support when helping with a support case. If you have sensitive information, it should be moved into scripts in Azure Storage, where access requires authentication.

Shell customizer

The shell customizer supports running shell scripts. The shell scripts must be publicly accessible or you must have configured an MSI for Image Builder to access them.

OS Support: Linux

Customize properties:

• type – Shell
• name - name for tracking the customization
• scriptUri - URI to the location of the file
• inline - array of shell commands, separated by commas.
• sha256Checksum - Value of sha256 checksum of the file, you generate this locally, and then Image Builder will checksum and validate.
  • To generate the sha256Checksum, using a terminal on Mac/Linux run: sha256sum <fileName>

Note

Inline commands are stored as part of the image template definition, you can see these when you dump out the image definition, and these are also visible to Microsoft Support in the event of a support case for troubleshooting purposes. If you have sensitive commands or values, it is strongly recommended these are moved into scripts, and use a user identity to authenticate to Azure Storage.

Super user privileges

For commands to run with super user privileges, they must be prefixed with sudo, you can add these into scripts or use it inline commands, for example:

Example of a script using sudo that you can reference using scriptUri:

Windows restart customizer

The Restart customizer allows you to restart a Windows VM and wait for it come back online, this allows you to install software that requires a reboot.

OS Support: Windows

Customize properties:

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• Type: WindowsRestart
• restartCommand - Command to execute the restart (optional). The default is 'shutdown /r /f /t 0 /c 'packer restart'.
• restartCheckCommand – Command to check if restart succeeded (optional).
• restartTimeout - Restart timeout specified as a string of magnitude and unit. For example, 5m (5 minutes) or 2h (2 hours). The default is: '5m'

Linux restart

There is no Linux Restart customizer, however, if you are installing drivers, or components that require a restart, you can install them and invoke a restart using the Shell customizer, there is a 20min SSH timeout to the build VM.

PowerShell customizer

The shell customizer supports running PowerShell scripts and inline command, the scripts must be publicly accessible for the IB to access them.

OS support: Windows and Linux

Customize properties:

• type – PowerShell.
• scriptUri - URI to the location of the PowerShell script file.
• inline – Inline commands to be run, separated by commas.
• validExitCodes – Optional, valid codes that can be returned from the script/inline command, this will avoid reported failure of the script/inline command.
• runElevated – Optional, boolean, support for running commands and scripts with elevated permissions.
• sha256Checksum - Value of sha256 checksum of the file, you generate this locally, and then Image Builder will checksum and validate.
  • To generate the sha256Checksum, using a PowerShell on Windows Get-Hash

File customizer

The File customizer lets Image Builder download a file from a GitHub repo or Azure storage. If you have an image build pipeline that relies on build artifacts, you can set the file customizer to download from the build share, and move the artifacts into the image.

OS support: Linux and Windows

File customizer properties:

• sourceUri - an accessible storage endpoint, this can be GitHub or Azure storage. You can only download one file, not an entire directory. If you need to download a directory, use a compressed file, then uncompress it using the Shell or PowerShell customizers.

Note

If the sourceUri is an Azure Storage Account, irrespective if the blob is marked public, you will to grant the Managed User Identity permissions to read access on the blob. Please see this example to set the storage permissions.

• destination – this is the full destination path and file name. Any referenced path and subdirectories must exist, use the Shell or PowerShell customizers to set these up beforehand. You can use the script customizers to create the path.

This is supported by Windows directories and Linux paths, but there are some differences:

• Linux OS’s – the only path Image builder can write to is /tmp.
• Windows – No path restriction, but the path must exist.

If there is an error trying to download the file, or put it in a specified directory, then customize step will fail, and this will be in the customization.log.

Note

The file customizer is only suitable for small file downloads, < 20MB. For larger file downloads, use a script or inline command, then use code to download files, such as, Linux wget or curl, Windows, Invoke-WebRequest.

Windows Update Customizer

This customizer is built on the community Windows Update Provisioner for Packer, which is an open source project maintained by the Packer community. Microsoft tests and validate the provisioner with the Image Builder service, and will support investigating issues with it, and work to resolve issues, however the open source project is not officially supported by Microsoft. For detailed documentation on and help with the Windows Update Provisioner, please see the project repository.

OS support: Windows

Customizer properties:

• type – WindowsUpdate.
• searchCriteria - Optional, defines which type of updates are installed (Recommended, Important etc.), BrowseOnly=0 and IsInstalled=0 (Recommended) is the default.
• filters – Optional, allows you to specify a filter to include or exclude updates.
• updateLimit – Optional, defines how many updates can be installed, default 1000.

Note

The Windows Update customizer can fail if there are any outstanding Windows restarts, or application installations still running, typically you may see this error in the customization.log, System.Runtime.InteropServices.COMException (0x80240016): Exception from HRESULT: 0x80240016. We strongly advise you consider adding in a Windows Restart, and/or allowing applications enough time to complete their installations using sleep or wait commands in the inline commands or scripts before running Windows Update.

Generalize

By default, Azure Image Builder will also run ‘deprovision’ code at the end of each image customization phase, to ‘generalize’ the image. Generalizing is a process where the image is set up so it can be reused to create multiple VMs. For Windows VMs, Azure Image Builder uses Sysprep. For Linux, Azure Image Builder runs ‘waagent -deprovision’.

The commands Image Builder users to generalize may not be suitable for every situation, so Azure Image Builder will allow you to customize this command, if needed.

If you are migrating existing customization, and you are using different Sysprep/waagent commands, you can use the Image Builder generic commands, and if the VM creation fails, use your own Sysprep or waagent commands.

If Azure Image Builder creates a Windows custom image successfully, and you create a VM from it, then find that the VM creation fails or does not complete successfully, you will need to review the Windows Server Sysprep documentation or raise a support request with the Windows Server Sysprep Customer Services Support team, who can troubleshoot and advise on the correct Sysprep usage.

Default Sysprep command

Default Linux deprovision command

Overriding the Commands

To override the commands, use the PowerShell or Shell script provisioners to create the command files with the exact file name, and put them in the correct directories:

• Windows: c:DeprovisioningScript.ps1
• Linux: /tmp/DeprovisioningScript.sh

Image Builder will read these commands, these are written out to the AIB logs, ‘customization.log’. See troubleshooting on how to collect logs.

Properties: distribute

Azure Image Builder supports three distribution targets:

• managedImage - managed image.
• sharedImage - Shared Image Gallery.
• VHD - VHD in a storage account.

You can distribute an image to both of the target types in the same configuration.

Note

The default AIB sysprep command does not include '/mode:vm', however this maybe required when create images that will have the HyperV role installed. If you need to add this command argument, you must override the sysprep command.

Because you can have more than one target to distribute to, Image Builder maintains a state for every distribution target that can be accessed by querying the runOutputName. The runOutputName is an object you can query post distribution for information about that distribution. For example, you can query the location of the VHD, or regions where the image version was replicated to, or SIG Image version created. This is a property of every distribution target. The runOutputName must be unique to each distribution target. Here is an example, this is querying a Shared Image Gallery distribution:

Output:

Distribute: managedImage

The image output will be a managed image resource.

Distribute properties:

• type – managedImage
• imageId – Resource ID of the destination image, expected format: /subscriptions/<subscriptionId>/resourceGroups/<destinationResourceGroupName>/providers/Microsoft.Compute/images/<imageName>
• location - location of the managed image.
• runOutputName – unique name for identifying the distribution.
• artifactTags - Optional user specified key value pair tags.

Note

The destination resource group must exist.If you want the image distributed to a different region, it will increase the deployment time .

Distribute: sharedImage

The Azure Shared Image Gallery is a new Image Management service that allows managing of image region replication, versioning and sharing custom images. Azure Image Builder supports distributing with this service, so you can distribute images to regions supported by Shared Image Galleries.

A Shared Image Gallery is made up of:

• Gallery - Container for multiple shared images. A gallery is deployed in one region.
• Image definitions - a conceptual grouping for images.
• Image versions - this is an image type used for deploying a VM or scale set. Image versions can be replicated to other regions where VMs need to be deployed.

Before you can distribute to the Image Gallery, you must create a gallery and an image definition, see Shared images.

Distribute properties for shared image galleries:

• type - sharedImage

• galleryImageId – ID of the shared image gallery, this can specified in two formats:

  • Automatic versioning - Image Builder will generate a monotonic version number for you, this is useful for when you want to keep rebuilding images from the same template: The format is: /subscriptions/<subscriptionId>/resourceGroups/<resourceGroupName>/providers/Microsoft.Compute/galleries/<sharedImageGalleryName>/images/<imageGalleryName>.
  • Explicit versioning - You can pass in the version number you want image builder to use. The format is:/subscriptions/<subscriptionID>/resourceGroups/<rgName>/providers/Microsoft.Compute/galleries/<sharedImageGalName>/images/<imageDefName>/versions/<version e.g. 1.1.1>

• runOutputName – unique name for identifying the distribution.

• artifactTags - Optional user specified key value pair tags.

• replicationRegions - Array of regions for replication. One of the regions must be the region where the Gallery is deployed. Adding regions will mean an increase of build time, as the build does not complete until the replication has completed.

• excludeFromLatest (optional) This allows you to mark the image version you create not be used as the latest version in the SIG definition, the default is 'false'.

• storageAccountType (optional) AIB supports specifying these types of storage for the image version that is to be created:

  • 'Standard_LRS'
  • 'Standard_ZRS'

Note

If the image template and referenced image definition are not in the same location, you will see additional time to create images. Image Builder currently does not have a location parameter for the image version resource, we take it from its parent image definition. For example, if an image definition is in westus and you want the image version replicated to eastus, a blob is copied to to westus, from this, an image version resource in westus is created, and then replicate to eastus. To avoid the additional replication time, ensure the image definition and image template are in the same location.

Distribute: VHD

You can output to a VHD. You can then copy the VHD, and use it to publish to Azure MarketPlace, or use with Azure Stack.

OS Support: Windows and Linux

Distribute VHD parameters:

• type - VHD.
• runOutputName – unique name for identifying the distribution.
• tags - Optional user specified key value pair tags.

Azure Image Builder does not allow the user to specify a storage account location, but you can query the status of the runOutputs to get the location.

Note

Once the VHD has been created, copy it to a different location, as soon as possible. The VHD is stored in a storage account in the temporary resource group created when the image template is submitted to the Azure Image Builder service. If you delete the image template, then you will lose the VHD.

Image Template Operations

Starting an Image Build

To start a build, you need to invoke 'Run' on the Image Template resource, examples of run commands:

Cancelling an Image Build

If you are running an image build that you believe is incorrect, waiting for user input, or you feel will never complete successfully, then you can cancel the build.

The build can be canceled any time. If the distribution phase has started you can still cancel, but you will need to clean up any images that may not be completed. The cancel command does not wait for cancel to complete, please monitor lastrunstatus.runstate for canceling progress, using these status commands.

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Examples of cancel commands:

Next steps

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There are sample .json files for different scenarios in the Azure Image Builder GitHub.