Using Templates

Templates can save precious time!

Set up a jail and create a template from it. All packages and preconfigured settings remain available for deployment to new jails within seconds.

Any jail can be converted between jail and template as needed. Essentially, a template is just another jail which has the property template set to yes. The difference is templates are not started by iocage.

Create a template with iocage:

  1. Create a jail: # iocage create -r 11.0-RELEASE -n mytemplate.

  2. Configure the jail’s networking.

  3. Install packages and/or customize the jail as needed.

  4. Once finished with customization, stop the jail: # iocage stop mytemplate.

  5. It is recommended to add notes to the jail, so the specific jail customizations are easily remembered: # iocage set notes="customized PHP,nginx jail" mytemplate

  6. Set the template property on: # iocage set template=yes mytemplate.

  7. Find the new template with iocage list -t.

Use the created template:

Use iocage create -t to create a new jail from the new template:

  1. # iocage create -t mytemplate -n jailfromtemplate

  2. Find the new jail with iocage list.

  3. Start the jail with # iocage start jailfromtemplate.

Done!

Customizing a template:

To make changes to the template, you will need to know whether any existing jails are based on the template. Since modifying the template will require converting it back into a jail, it cannot be the base for any jails.

* No jails based on the template *

  1. Convert the template back into a jail:

    iocage set template=no [UUID | NAME].

  2. Start the jail:

    iocage start [UUID | NAME].

  3. Use any method you wish to connect to the jail and modify its contents.

  4. Stop the jail:

    iocage stop [UUID | NAME].

  5. Convert the jail back into a template:

    iocage set template=yes [UUID | NAME].

* Jails based on the template *

This process will create a new template, leaving the existing template and jails unaffected.

  1. Create a ‘thick’ jail from the template, so that it will be independent from the template:

    iocage create -T -t [UUID | NAME] -n newtemplate.

  2. Start the jail:

    iocage start newtemplate.

  3. Use any method you wish to connect to the jail and modify its contents.

  4. Stop the jail:

    iocage stop newtemplate.

  5. Convert the jail into a template:

    iocage set template=yes newtemplate.