Minimal

Revision 40 as of 2018-07-06 22:02:18

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Ubuntu Minimal

What are Ubuntu Minimal Cloud Images?

The Ubuntu Minimal Cloud Images are Ubuntu cloud images designed for automated deployment at scale and made available across a range of cloud substrates. Specifically optimised for running on their target substrate, they have extraneous userspace bits removed and streamlined kernels built to boot as fast as possible on that substrate.

With full support for installing from the Ubuntu archive, Ubuntu Minimal Cloud Images have access to the same breadth of software, and the same excellent security maintenance, as the regular cloud images. Combined with full snap support, anything you can do with the regular Ubuntu images, you can do with the minimal images.

For users that require commercial support, Ubuntu Advantage support for Ubuntu Minimal Cloud Images is available on the same terms as regular cloud images.

Where can I find Ubuntu Minimal Cloud Images?

Downloads

Available for download, for use with KVM and LXD, on Bionic and Xenial.

Amazon Web Services

Available on AWS, in all regions View of images in us-west-2 (change the region in your console to search other regions):

https://us-west-2.console.aws.amazon.com/ec2/v2/home?region=us-west-2#Images:visibility=public-images;name=ubuntu-minimal/images/hvm-ssd/ubuntu-;ownerAlias=099720109477;sort=desc:name

Command-line list of latest AMI ID per region for a particular release (Xenial in this example): 

   1 sstream-query http://cloud-images.ubuntu.com/minimal/releases/ \
   2   content_id=com.ubuntu.cloud:released:aws \
   3   release=xenial \
   4   -o '%(region)s, %(id)s'

An example of using the AWS CLI to find the latest AMIs for a release in a region with machine consumable output: 

   1 aws --output table ec2 describe-images --output json --owner 099720109477 \
   2   --region us-west-2 \
   3   --filters "Name=name,Values=ubuntu-minimal/images/hvm-ssd/ubuntu-xenial*" \
   4   --query 'sort_by(Images, &CreationDate)[-1].{Name: Name, ImageId: ImageId, CreationDate: CreationDate}'

This provides a list of Xenial release images. Change the release name in the --filter option to find other releases (e.g. substitute 'bionic' for 'xenial').

Google Compute Engine

Available on GCE 

   1 gcloud compute images list \
   2   --filter="FAMILY:ubuntu-minimal-1804-lts OR FAMILY:ubuntu-minimal-1604-lts"

This provides a list of release images.

Launching Ubuntu Minimal

KVM

When launching the download image from KVM, you will need to specify the virtio network driver.

LXD

First add the new Ubuntu Minimal images simplestreams endpoint: 

   1 lxc remote add --protocol simplestreams ubuntu-minimal https://cloud-images.ubuntu.com/minimal/releases/

Xenial:

Launch the Xenial minimal image: 

   1 lxc launch ubuntu-minimal:xenial

Bionic:

Launch the Bionic minimal image: 

   1 lxc launch ubuntu-minimal:bionic

Additional Info