Downloading IBM-hosted AIX VMs and importing them into Skytap

Skytap gives you several ways to add to AIX VMs to your virtual environments. You can:

Import fully-configured AIX LPARs from your on-premises data center into Skytap. For instructions, see Importing AIX LPARs into Skytap.
Quickly create new VMs from our pre-licensed public templates. For instructions, see Skytap public templates.
Download “ready-to-deploy” images from your IBM Entitled Systems Support (ESS) account, and import them into Skytap.

To download IBM-hosted AIX VMs and then import them into Skytap

You must have an ESS account and an AIX standard edition license to perform these steps.

Sign into your ESS account.
Use IBM’s instructions to download either AIX 7.1 TL 5 or AIX 7.2 TL 2.

IBM’s instructions are in the PowerVC compatible “ready to deploy” images for AIX 7.1 TL 5 and AIX 7.2 TL 2 section at AIX 2017 TL Release Overview and Related Software Updates.
After the file is downloaded to your computer, unzip the disk image. For example:
```
 gzip -d AIX_v7.2_Virt_Mach_Image_7200-02-00_102017.gz
```

Create an .ovf file that references the disk image. For example: myAIXLPAR.ovf.

In the .ovf file:

The ovf:File ovf:href and rasd:ElementName fields must match the filename of the disk image.
The size and capacity fields must match the size of the disk image.

Example .ovf file

myAIXLPAR.ovf

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<ovf:Envelope xmlns:rasd="http://schemas.dmtf.org/wbem/wscim/1/cim-schema/2/CIM_ResourceAllocationSettingData" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xmlns:ovf="http://schemas.dmtf.org/ovf/envelope/1">
 <ovf:References>
   <ovf:File ovf:href="AIX_v7.2_Virt_Mach_Image_7200-02-00_102017" ovf:id="file1" ovf:size="21474836480"/>
 </ovf:References>
 <ovf:DiskSection>
   <ovf:Info>Disk Section</ovf:Info>
   <ovf:Disk ovf:capacity="21474836480" ovf:capacityAllocationUnits="byte" ovf:diskId="disk1" ovf:fileRef="file1"/>
 </ovf:DiskSection>
 <ovf:VirtualSystemCollection>
   <ovf:VirtualSystem ovf:id="vs0">
     <ovf:Name>AIX_Boot_Data_Image</ovf:Name>
     <ovf:Info></ovf:Info>
     <ovf:ProductSection>
       <ovf:Info/>
       <ovf:Product/>
     </ovf:ProductSection>
     <ovf:OperatingSystemSection ovf:id="9">
       <ovf:Info/>
       <ovf:Description>AIX</ovf:Description>
       <ns0:architecture xmlns:ns0="ibmpvc">ppc64</ns0:architecture>
     </ovf:OperatingSystemSection>
     <ovf:VirtualHardwareSection>
       <ovf:Info>Storage resources</ovf:Info>
       <ovf:Item>
         <rasd:Description></rasd:Description>
         <rasd:ElementName>AIX_v7.2_Virt_Mach_Image_7200-02-00_102017</rasd:ElementName>
         <rasd:HostResource>ovf:/disk/disk1</rasd:HostResource>
         <rasd:InstanceID>1</rasd:InstanceID>
         <rasd:ResourceType>17</rasd:ResourceType>
         <ns1:boot xmlns:ns1="ibmpvc">True</ns1:boot>
       </ovf:Item>
     </ovf:VirtualHardwareSection>
   </ovf:VirtualSystem>
   <ovf:Info></ovf:Info>
   <ovf:Name>AIX_Boot_Data_Image</ovf:Name>
 </ovf:VirtualSystemCollection>
</ovf:Envelope>

Use the Skytap Imports page to import the .ovf file and disk image. For detailed instructions, see Importing AIX LPARs into Skytap. Skip the instructions for exporting an LPAR and begin with Step 2: Create import job.