Packer based PVE image templates

Table of Contents

• Packer based PVE image templates
  • Table of Contents
  • Initial Setup
    • Create Token
    • Initialize Packer
  • Build
  • Setup new templates

Initial Setup

Create Token

1. Copy template-credentials.pkr.hcl to credentials.auto.pkrvars.hcl
2. Open your Proxmox VE web interface & Login.
3. Navigate to: Datacenter -> Permissions -> API Tokens
4. Click: Add
5. Configure in the dialog:
   1. User: root@pam (or the user you like, but It needs administrative permissions)
   2. Token ID: packer
   3. Privilege Separation: false
6. Click: Add
7. Copy the displayed Token ID and Token Secret to credentials.auto.pkrvars.hcl

Initialize Packer

Run packer init to initialize Packer according to a HCL template configuration. It's downloads and installs the required Plugins according to the required_plugins block in Packer templates.

mise run init <path-to-template-directory>

Build

To build a template run:

mise run build <path-to-template-directory>

Setup new templates

Run:

mise run setup <distribution name> <version>

E.g. mise run setup debian 13-trixie or mise run setup nixos 25.11.