Clean install Debian 13 on VMware ESXi identified possible datasources for system []

[petrkr]

Bug report

cloud init show me huge warning message, which told me to fill BUG report, so I filling bug report. I see cloud-init for 1 hour and I do not know what it means.

Steps to reproduce the problem

Install fresh expert debian 13 just with SSH, without gui, withou user (just root) on VMware ESXi 7.0 hypervisor

Environment details

• Cloud-init version: 25.1.4
• Operating System Distribution:

PRETTY_NAME="Debian GNU/Linux 13 (trixie)"
NAME="Debian GNU/Linux"
VERSION_ID="13"
VERSION="13 (trixie)"
VERSION_CODENAME=trixie
DEBIAN_VERSION_FULL=13.1

• Cloud provider, platform or installer type: VMware ESXi, x86_64, fresh Debian 13 installed from netinstall ISO

cloud-init logs

The --include-userdata flag is deprecated and does nothing.

cloud-init.tar.gz

Regards
Petr

[blackboxsw]

Thank you @petrkr for filing this bug and improving cloud-init and thanks for the attached logs.

This warning is raised with ds-identify doesn't discover a viable datasource in early boot from various system artifacts like DMI data, expected tools or seed directories.

Specific to vmware, ds-identify looks at the following:

• environment vars
• asserting DMI VIRT== vmware
• assert presence of vmware tools
• and assert presence of vmware-rpctool info-get guestinfo.userdata exists or vmware plugins/vmsvc/libdeployPkgPlugin.so

Looking over your logs, /run/cloud-init/ds-identify.log tells us No ds found [mode=search, notfound=disabled]. Disabled cloud-init [1]

But it shows DMI value for VIRT=vmware which means it did not return DS_NOT_FOUND due to DMI

This leaves us with one of 2 causes:

1. the image doesn't contain either vmware-rpctool or vmto_infolsd
2. the machine doesn't have any of the following:

• vmware-rpctool info-get guetsinfo.metadata, userdata OR vendordata OR VMware guest customization module installed plugins/vmsvc/libdeployPkgPlugin.so somewhere under /usr/lib

I see vmware-rcptool calls succeeding in /var/log/cloud-init.log on your system, so it's not #1 that causes ds-identify to not discover the VMware datasourcea

Some followup questions:

1. Does this machine have non-empty any responses from vmware-rpctool info-get guestinfo.metadata, or userdata or vendordata?
2. Can you locate a file named libdeployPkgPlugin.so on this system somewhere?
3. /var/log/cloud-init.log only shows it running the init stage of cloud-init. We expect to see init-local, init, modules:config and final stages running as separate systemd units, Our debugging guide docs may help in this regard. Can you provide the results of the following commands:

systemctl status cloud-init-main,service
systemctl status cloud-init-local,service
systemctl status cloud-init-network,service
systemctl status cloud-config.service
systemctl status cloud-final.service

[petrkr]

Hello.

root@testvm13:~# vmtoolsd --cmd "info-get guestinfo.metadata" | jq .

{
  "instance-id": "debian-001",
  "local-hostname": "testvm13"
}

root@testvm13:~# vmware-rpctool info-get guestinfo.metadata

One and exactly one argument expected

root@testvm13:~# find / |grep libdeployPkgPlugin
/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/open-vm-tools/plugins/vmsvc/libdeployPkgPlugin.so

root@testvm13:~# systemctl status cloud-init-main

○ cloud-init-main.service - Cloud-init: Single Process
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/cloud-init-main.service; enabled; preset: enable>
     Active: inactive (dead) since Mon 2025-10-13 17:00:09 CEST; 2 days ago
   Duration: 2.372s
 Invocation: 1ce8d3a738f1445ead27dfcbf7d9fb64
   Main PID: 468 (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
     Status: "Completed"
   Mem peak: 67.8M
        CPU: 2.270s

Oct 13 17:00:08 testvm13 cloud-init[1042]: ##################################################>
Oct 13 17:00:08 testvm13 cloud-init[1043]: -----BEGIN SSH HOST KEY FINGERPRINTS-----
Oct 13 17:00:08 testvm13 cloud-init[1045]: 256 SHA256:4Hevf65Alsh+xLZLK9mjMIryGwUAfFy5hgcLnwm>
Oct 13 17:00:08 testvm13 cloud-init[1047]: 256 SHA256:XGPMUaok7M75t895IE00eGLGMYUsT7nQl6O2U2A>
Oct 13 17:00:08 testvm13 cloud-init[1049]: 3072 SHA256:klNyB1neHSjWxE8vNOME1eFBxsRlLePUVVBLA8>
Oct 13 17:00:08 testvm13 cloud-init[1050]: -----END SSH HOST KEY FINGERPRINTS-----
Oct 13 17:00:08 testvm13 cloud-init[1051]: ##################################################>
Oct 13 17:00:08 testvm13 cloud-init[847]: Cloud-init v. 25.1.4 finished at Mon, 13 Oct 2025 1>
Oct 13 17:00:09 testvm13 systemd[1]: cloud-init-main.service: Deactivated successfully.
Oct 13 17:00:09 testvm13 systemd[1]: cloud-init-main.service: Consumed 2.270s CPU time, 67.8M>

root@testvm13:~# systemctl status cloud-init-local

● cloud-init-local.service - Cloud-init: Local Stage (pre-network)
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/cloud-init-local.service; enabled; preset: enabl>
     Active: active (exited) since Mon 2025-10-13 17:00:07 CEST; 2 days ago
 Invocation: e17ae71c98384f568c6dd497f0d56587
   Main PID: 779 (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
   Mem peak: 1.8M
        CPU: 22ms

Oct 13 17:00:07 testvm13 systemd[1]: Starting cloud-init-local.service - Cloud-init: Local St>
Oct 13 17:00:07 testvm13 sh[796]: Completed socket interaction for boot stage local
Oct 13 17:00:07 testvm13 systemd[1]: Finished cloud-init-local.service - Cloud-init: Local St>

root@testvm13:~# systemctl status cloud-init-network

● cloud-init-network.service - Cloud-init: Network Stage
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/cloud-init-network.service; enabled; preset: ena>
     Active: active (exited) since Mon 2025-10-13 17:00:08 CEST; 2 days ago
 Invocation: 3924141373fb498293e6bc2dbc5ec9b4
   Main PID: 944 (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
   Mem peak: 2M
        CPU: 39ms

Oct 13 17:00:07 testvm13 systemd[1]: Starting cloud-init-network.service - Cloud-init: Networ>
Oct 13 17:00:08 testvm13 sh[947]: Completed socket interaction for boot stage network
Oct 13 17:00:08 testvm13 systemd[1]: Finished cloud-init-network.service - Cloud-init: Networ>

root@testvm13:~# systemctl status cloud-config

● cloud-config.service - Cloud-init: Config Stage
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/cloud-config.service; enabled; preset: enabled)
     Active: active (exited) since Mon 2025-10-13 17:00:08 CEST; 2 days ago
 Invocation: e902ffebc5c845d7be0b0150ef871104
   Main PID: 983 (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
   Mem peak: 1.6M
        CPU: 33ms

Oct 13 17:00:08 testvm13 systemd[1]: Starting cloud-config.service - Cloud-init: Config Stage>
Oct 13 17:00:08 testvm13 sh[990]: Completed socket interaction for boot stage config
Oct 13 17:00:08 testvm13 systemd[1]: Finished cloud-config.service - Cloud-init: Config Stage.

root@testvm13:~# systemctl status cloud-final

● cloud-final.service - Cloud-init: Final Stage
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/cloud-final.service; enabled; preset: enabled)
     Active: active (exited) since Mon 2025-10-13 17:00:08 CEST; 2 days ago
 Invocation: 0d9dc1345f144387bae2c49b3eb8ee69
   Main PID: 1037 (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
   Mem peak: 1.7M
        CPU: 39ms

Oct 13 17:00:08 testvm13 systemd[1]: Starting cloud-final.service - Cloud-init: Final Stage...
Oct 13 17:00:08 testvm13 sh[1040]: Completed socket interaction for boot stage final
Oct 13 17:00:08 testvm13 systemd[1]: Finished cloud-final.service - Cloud-init: Final Stage.
root@testvm13:~#