OpenShift Virtualization 4.7 Highlights

Introduction

Here at Red Hat, our goal is to make the user experience fast and intuitive. Red Hat OpenShift Virtualization 4.7 now delivers a much improved and easier experience when creating virtual machines from templates. 

OpenShift Virtualization has always shipped with a set of OpenShift templates that have been carefully created, tested, and maintained to provide the best configuration for a virtual machine running on our platform. These templates are based on the operating system and runtime requirements of the workload running on it. We refer to these templates as common-templates.

In the latest release, the common templates are now surfaced in the UI so they can easily be created from. This allows us to simplify the virtual machine creation flow by having readily available templates for our users to choose from. Today, this improvement lowers the barrier for new users who want to quickly create their first virtual machine.

Creating Virtual Machines in the Administrator Console

Screen capture of the new Virtualization page

In the administrator perspective, virtual machines can be created in the Virtualization page inside the Templates tab by both administrators and developers with privileges. One thing to note is that before creating a virtual machine from a template, a boot source must be added because they are not yet provided with templates. Users can add a boot source via the UI directly from the Boot Source column by clicking on the Add source link, or in Step 2 of the Create Virtual Machine from template wizard. Our users can provision for a boot source by any one of these methods shown in the diagram below. 

Four options available to add a boot source

• Upload local file (creates a PVC)
• Import via URL (creates a PVC)
• Clone existing PVC (creates a PVC)
• Import via Registry (creates a PVC)

Virtual machines with boot sources will show as available in the boot source column. These templates are ready to have virtual machines deployed from them.

Operating System Support

New Create Virtual Machine from template wizard

When creating a virtual machine from a template, users could have up to four template options to consider. These options are Red Hat Supported, Red Hat Provided, User Provided, and User Supported. Red Hat Provided means that the template comes pre-installed with OpenShift Virtualization. Red Hat Supported means that the operating system this template represents is fully supported by Red Hat. Log in and learn more about Red Hat support here.

User Provided and User Supported would generally be customized templates. In other words, these are third-party templates that were provided and maintained by someone other than Red Hat. Here is a list of guest operating systems that are currently covered by Red Hat OpenShift Virtualization 4.7 virtual machine templates:

Customizing a Template

Administrators can also create a customized virtual machine from a template in this latest release of OpenShift Virtualization. In Step 2 of the Create a Virtual Machine with a template wizard, the user will be presented with an editable pre-filled form and the ability to create a virtual machine. Additionally, a Customize virtual machine button is presented. Upon clicking this button, a new wizard will open, guiding the user through stepped instructions. This allows them to customize pertinent details ranging from virtual machine name, flavor, and workload type to network interfaces and disks with regards to networking and storage capabilities. Once the user has reviewed his virtual machine settings and is satisfied, he can create his customized virtual machine.

Creating Virtual Machines in the Developer Console

Virtual machine templates in the developer console

As aforementioned, it is now possible for developers to quickly create virtual machines in the developer’s perspective of the console without switching to the administrative side. This is a big user experience improvement for developers on the console. The advantage to this is that developers do not have to tinker with configurations to create a virtual machine. Instead, they have readily available out-of-the-box templates to quickly deploy virtual machines for their projects.

In the Add page we have introduced a new Virtual Machines card which takes users to the virtual machines templates page. Here, developers can now easily scan virtual machine templates in the form of cards and glean some basic information with regards to the template provider, the virtual machine type, flavor, and storage. Once a template is selected, a short form is presented with prefilled editable data for the virtual machine’s name and flavor. These templates always come with a boot source attached to them so that the developer can skip the boot source attachment step and focus on creating his virtual machine. This enables developers to create virtual machines in only two clicks.

Summary

The latest version of OpenShift Virtualization 4.7 has improved the overall user experience for administrators to create virtual machines from templates with as little as two clicks via the UI. Developers will also be pleased with the newly added frictionless virtual machine creation flow in the developer console. Advanced users can also now bypass the CLI option and use the UI not only to create virtual machines, but also to customize templates to create custom virtual machines. These new enhancements bring simplicity and speed to the virtual machine creation flow and greatly improve the overall user experience for our users.

Our work isn’t done yet as we strive to continue bringing new and better user experiences to OpenShift Virtualization. Some new improvements to expect in the upcoming releases will be around Automation, SSH, and Custom Boot Sources.

You too can join this ongoing process to improve our user experience with your feedback by signing up to participate in our UX research here.