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HashiCorp Packer

Score8.6 out of 10

5 Reviews and Ratings

What is HashiCorp Packer?

HashiCorp Packer automates the creation of machine images, coming out of the box with support to build images for Amazon EC2, CloudStack, DigitalOcean, Docker, Google Compute Engine, Microsoft Azure, QEMU, VirtualBox, and VMware.

Best Image Builder in Market

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We mainly use packer for creating Images on the fly with required tunning and use it with Our Configuration management tools or any IAC tool. We integrate Packer with multiple frameworks such as Chef or Puppet to install and configure the software. It acts for me as Machine Image As A Code. The main scope for us to use Packer is to automate our Image creation process and get away from the Golden Image concept so that we can bring Updated images in an automated way.

Pros

  • Multi-provider portability
  • Greater testability
  • Super fast infrastructure deployment

Cons

  • Manageability
  • Manageability
  • Manageability

Most Important Features

  • Appliance/Demo Creation
  • Dev/Prod Parity
  • Super fast infrastructure deployment

Return on Investment

  • Super fast infrastructure deployment
  • Quick turnaround of infrastructure in multiple cloud using single tool.
  • Increase productivity by reducing time in infrastructure building.

Alternatives Considered

Azure DevOps Services, Jenkins and Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform

Other Software Used

Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform, Terraform, by HashiCorp, Jenkins

Usability