ISO/IEC 17203:2017

Information technology — Open Virtualization Format (OVF) specification

The Open Virtualization Format (OVF) Specification describes an open, secure, efficient and extensible format for the packaging and distribution of software to be run in virtual systems. The OVF package enables the authoring of portable virtual systems and the transport of virtual systems between virtualization platforms. This version of the specification (2.1) is intended to allow OVF 1.x tools to work with OVF 2.x descriptors in the following sense: Existing OVF 1.x tools should be able to parse OVF 2.x descriptors. Existing OVF 1.x tools should be able to give warnings/errors if dependencies to 2.x features are required for correct operation. If a conflict arises between the schema, text, or tables, the order of precedence to resolve the conflicts is schema; then text; then tables. Figures are for illustrative purposes only and are not a normative part of the standard. A table may constrain the text but it shall not conflict with it. The profile conforms to the cited CIM Schema classes where used. Any requirements contained in the cited CIM Schema classes shall be met. If a conflict arises the CIM Schema takes precedence. The profile conforms to the cited OVF XML Schema. It may constrain the schema but it shall not conflict with it. If a conflict arises the OVF XML Schema takes precedence.

Technologies de l'information — Spécification du format de virtualisation ouvert (OVF)

General Information

• Status: Published
• Publication Date: 20-Sep-2017
• ICS: 35.100.05 - Multilayer applications
• Technical Committee: ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 38 - Cloud computing and distributed platforms
• Drafting Committee: ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 38 - Cloud computing and distributed platforms
• Current Stage: 9093 - International Standard confirmed
• Completion Date: 05-Dec-2022

Relations

• Revises: ISO/IEC 17203:2011 - Information technology — Open Virtualization Format (OVF) specification
• Effective Date: 30-Jul-2016

Standards Content (Sample)

INTERNATIONAL ISO/IEC
STANDARD 17203
Second edition
2017-09
Information technology — Open
Virtualization Format (OVF)
specification
Technologies de l'information — Spécification du format de
virtualisation ouvert (OVF)
Reference number
ISO/IEC 17203:2017(E)
©
ISO/IEC 2017

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ISO/IEC 17203:2017(E)

COPYRIGHT PROTECTED DOCUMENT
© ISO/IEC 2017, Published in Switzerland
All rights reserved. Unless otherwise specified, no part of this publication may be reproduced or utilized otherwise in any form
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ISO/IEC 17203:2017(E)
Foreword
ISO (the International Organization for Standardization) and IEC (the International
Electrotechnical Commission) form the specialized system for worldwide standardization.
National bodies that are members of ISO or IEC participate in the development of
International Standards through technical committees established by the respective
organization to deal with particular fields of technical activity. ISO and IEC technical
committees collaborate in fields of mutual interest. Other international organizations,
governmental and non‐governmental, in liaison with ISO and IEC, also take part in the
work. In the field of information technology, ISO and IEC have established a joint technical
committee, ISO/IEC JTC 1.
The procedures used to develop this document and those intended for its further
maintenance are described in the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 1. In particular the different
approval criteria needed for the different types of document should be noted. This
document was drafted in accordance with the editorial rules of the ISO/IEC Directives,
Part 2 (see http://www.iso.org/directives).
Attention is drawn to the possibility that some of the elements of this document may be
the subject of patent rights. ISO and IEC shall not be held responsible for identifying any
or all such patent rights. Details of any patent rights identified during the development
of the document will be in the Introduction and/or on the ISO list of patent declarations
received (see www.iso.org/patents).
Any trade name used in this document is information given for the convenience of users
and does not constitute an endorsement.
For an explanation on the voluntary nature of Standard, the meaning of the ISO specific
terms and expressions related to conformity assessment, as well as information about
ISO’s adherence to the WTO principles in the Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) see the
following URL: Foreword – Supplementary information
This document was prepared by ANSI (as INCITS 469‐2015) and was adopted, under a
special “fast‐track procedure”, by Joint Technical Committee ISO/IEC JTC 1, Information
technology.
The list of all currently available parts of ISO/IEC 17203 series, under the general title
Information technology, can be found on the ISO web site.

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ISO/IEC 17203:2017(E)
CONTENTS
1  Scope . 1
2  Normative references . 1
3  Terms and definitions . 3
4  Symbols and abbreviated terms . 5
5  OVF package . 5
5.1  OVF package structure . 5
5.2  Virtual disk formats . 6
5.3  OVF package options . 6
5.4  Distribution as a set of files . 7
6  OVF descriptor . 7
7  Envelope element . 8
7.1  File references . 8
7.2  Content element . 9
7.3  Extensibility . 10
7.4  Conformance . 10
8  Virtual hardware description . 11
8.1  VirtualHardwareSection . 11
8.2  Extensibility . 12
8.3  Virtual hardware elements . 12
8.4  Ranges on elements . 14
9  Core metadata sections . 16
9.1  DiskSection . 17
9.2  NetworkSection . 18
9.3  ResourceAllocationSection . 18
9.4  AnnotationSection . 19
9.5  ProductSection . 19
9.6  EulaSection . 21
9.7  StartupSection . 22
9.8  DeploymentOptionSection . 23
9.9  OperatingSystemSection . 24
9.10  InstallSection . 24
9.11  EnvironmentFilesSection . 24
9.12  BootDeviceSection . 25
9.13  SharedDiskSection . 25
9.14  ScaleOutSection . 26
9.15  PlacementGroupSection and PlacementSection . 27
9.16  EncryptionSection . 28
10  Internationalization . 29
10.1  Internal resource bundles . 29
10.2  External resource bundles . 29
10.3  Message content in external file . 30
11  OVF environment and OVF environment file . 30
11.1  Transport media . 31
11.2  Transport media type . 31
ANNEX A (informative) Symbols and conventions . 33
ANNEX B (normative) OVF XSD . 34
ANNEX C (informative) OVF mime type registration template . 35
ANNEX D (informative) OVF examples . 37
D.1  Examples of OVF package structure . 37
D.2  Examples of distribution of files . 37
D.3  Example of envelope element . 38
D.4  Example of file references . 38
D.5  Example of content element . 39
D.6  Examples of extensibility. 39
D.7  Examples of VirtualHardwareSection . 40
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ISO/IEC 17203:2017(E)
D.8  Examples of virtual hardware elements . 40
D.9  Example of ranges on elements . 41
D.10  Example of DiskSection . 42
D.11  Example of NetworkSection . 42
D.12  Example of ResourceAllocationSection . 42
D.13  Example of annotation . 43
D.14  Example of Product section . 43
D.15  Example of EULA section . 43
D.16  Example of StartupSection . 44
D.17  Example of DeploymentOptionSection . 44
D.18  Example of OperatingSystemSection . 45
D.19  Example of InstallSection . 45
D.20  Example of EnvironmentFilesSection . 45
D.21  Example of BootDeviceSection . 45
D.22  Example of SharedDiskSection . 46
D.23  Example of ScaleOutSection . 46
D.24  Example of PlcementGroupSection . 47
D.25  Example of EncryptionSection . 48
D.26  Example of internationalization . 49
D.27  Example of message content in an external file . 50
D.28  Example of environment document . 51
ANNEX E (informative) Network port profile examples . 52
E.1  Example 1 (OVF descriptor for one virtual system and one network with an inlined
network port profile) . 52
E.2  Example 2 (OVF descriptor for one virtual system and one network with a locally
referenced network port profile) . 53
E.3  Example 3 (OVF descriptor for one virtual system and one network with a network
port profile referenced by a URI) . 55
E.4  Example 4 (OVF descriptor for two virtual systems and one network with two network
port profiles referenced by URIs) . 57
E.5  Example 5 (networkportprofile1.xml) . 59
E.6  Example 6 (networkportprofile2.xml) . 60
ANNEX F (informative) Deployment considerations . 61
F.1  OVF package structure deployment considerations . 61
F.2  Virtual hardware deployment considerations . 61
F.3  Core metadata sections deployment considerations . 61

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ISO/IEC 17203:2017(E)
Tables
Table 1 – XML namespace prefixes . 8
Table 2 – Actions for child elements with ovf:required attribute . 12
Table 3 – HostResource element . 13
Table 4 – Elements for virtual devices and controllers . 14
Table 5 – Core metadata sections . 16
Table 6 – Property types . 21
Table 7 – Property qualifiers . 21
Table 8 – Availability attributes . 27
Table 9 – Affinity Attributes . 28
Table 10 – Allowed combinations of scoped affinity and availability . 28
Table 11 – Core sections for OEF . 31


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ISO/IEC 17203:2017(E)

AMERICAN NATIONAL STANDARD INCITS 469-2015


American National Standard
for Information Technology –
Open Virtualization Format
(OVF) Specification

1 Scope
The Open Virtualization Format (OVF) Specification describes an open, secure, efficient and
extensible format for the packaging and distribution of software to be run in virtual systems.
The OVF package enables the authoring of portable virtual systems and the transport of virtual
systems between virtualization platforms. This version of the specification (2.1) is intended to allow
OVF 1.x tools to work with OVF 2.x descriptors in the following sense:
 Existing OVF 1.x tools should be able to parse OVF 2.x descriptors.
 Existing OVF 1.x tools should be able to give warnings/errors if dependencies to 2.x
features are required for correct operation.
If a conflict arises between the schema, text, or tables, the order of precedence to resolve the conflicts
is schema; then text; then tables. Figures are for illustrative purposes only and are not a normative
part of the standard.
A table may constrain the text but it shall not conflict with it.
The profile conforms to the cited CIM Schema classes where used. Any requirements contained in the
cited CIM Schema classes shall be met. If a conflict arises the CIM Schema takes precedence.
The profile conforms to the cited OVF XML Schema. It may constrain the schema but it shall not
conflict with it. If a conflict arises the OVF XML Schema takes precedence.
2 Normative references
The following standards contain provisions which, through reference in this text, constitute provisions
of this American National Standard. All standards are subject to revision, and parties to agreements
based on this American National Standard are encouraged to investigate the possibility of applying
the most recent editions of the standards indicated below.
The following referenced documents are indispensable for the application of this document. For dated
or versioned references, only the edition cited (including any corrigenda or DMTF update versions)
applies. For references without a date or version, the latest published edition of the referenced
document (including any corrigenda or DMTF update versions) applies.
DMTF DSP0004, Common Information Model (CIM) Infrastructure Specification
d_documents/DSP0004_2.7.pdf
2.7, http://www.dmtf.org/standards/publishe
DMTF DSP0223, Generic Operations 1.0,
http://www.dmtf.org/standards/published_documents/DSP0223_1.0.pdf
DMTF DSP0230, WS-CIM Mapping Specification
1.0, http://www.dmtf.org/sites/default/files/standards/documents/DSP0230_1.0.2.pdf
DMTF DSP1001, Management Profile Specification Usage Guide 1.1,
http://www.dmtf.org/standards/published_documents/DSP1001_1.1.pdf
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ISO/IEC 17203:2017(E)

INCITS 469-2015
DMTF DSP1041, Resource Allocation Profile (RAP)
1.1, http://www.dmtf.org/standards/published_documents/DSP1041_1.1.pdf
DMTF DSP1043, Allocation Capabilities Profile (ACP)
1.0, http://www.dmtf.org/standards/published_documents/DSP1043_1.0.pdf
DMTF DSP1047, Storage Resource Virtualization Profile
1.0, http://www.dmtf.org/standards/published_documents/DSP1047_1.0.pdf
DMTF DSP1050, Ethernet Port Resource Virtualization Profile 1.0,
http://www.dmtf.org/standards/published_documents/DSP1050_1.0.pdf
DMTF DSP1057, Virtual System Profile
1.0, http://www.dmtf.org/standards/published_documents/DSP1057_1.0.pdf
DMTF DSP8023, OVF XML Schema Specification for OVF Envelope
2.0, http://schemas.dmtf.org/ovf/envelope/2/dsp8023_2.0.xsd
DMTF DSP8027, OVF XML Schema Specification for OVF Environment
1.1, http://schemas.dmtf.org/ovf/environment/1/dsp8027_1.1.xsd
DMTF DSP8049, Network Port Profile XML Schema,
http://schemas.dmtf.org/ovf/networkportprofile/1/dsp8049_1.0.xsd
IETF RFC1738, T. Berners-Lee, Uniform Resource Locators (URL), December
1994, http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc1738
IETF RFC1952, P. Deutsch, GZIP file format specification version 4.3, May
1996, http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc1952
IETF RFC2616, R. Fielding et al, Hypertext Transfer Protocol – HTTP/1.1, June
1999, http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2616
IETF Standard 66, Uniform Resource Identifiers (URI): Generic Syntax,
http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc3986
IETF Standard 68, Augmented BNF for Syntax Specifications: ABNF,
http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc5234
ISO 9660, 1988 Information processing-Volume and file structure of CD-ROM for information
interchange, http://www.iso.org/iso/iso_catalogue/catalogue_tc/catalogue_detail.htm?csnumber=1750
5
ISO, ISO/IEC Directives, Part 2, Rules for the structure and drafting of International
Standards, http://isotc.iso.org/livelink/livelink.exe?func=ll&objId=4230456&objAction=browse&sort=su
btype
ISO/IEC/IEEE 9945:2009: Information technology -- Portable Operating System Interface (POSIX®)
Base Specifications, Issue 7
http://www.iso.org/iso/iso_catalogue/catalogue_tc/catalogue_detail.htm?csnumber=50516
W3C, XML Schema Part 1: Structures Second Edition. 28 October 2004. W3C Recommendation.
URL: http://www.w3.org/TR/2004/REC-xmlschema-1-20041028/
W3C, XML Schema Part 2: Datatypes Second Edition. 28 October 2004. W3C Recommendation.
URL: http://www.w3.org/TR/2004/REC-xmlschema-2-20041028/
W3C, XML Encryption Syntax and Processing Version 1.1, 13 March 2012, W3C Candidate
Recommendation
http://www.w3.org/TR/2012/CR-xmlenc-core1-20120313/
FIPS 180-2: Secure Hash Standard (SHS)
http://csrc.nist.gov/publications/fips/fips180-2/fips180-2.pdf
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ISO/IEC 17203:2017(E)

 INCITS 469-2015
3 Terms and definitions
In this document, some terms have a specific meaning beyond the normal English meaning. Those
terms are defined in this clause.
The terms "shall" ("required"), "shall not", "should" ("recommended"), "should not" ("not
recommended"), "may," "need not" ("not required"), "can" and "cannot" in this document are to be
interpreted as described in ISO/IEC Directives, Part 2, Annex H. The terms in parenthesis are
alternatives for the preceding term, for use in exceptional cases when the preceding term cannot be
used for linguistic reasons. Note that ISO/IEC Directives, Part 2, Annex H specifies additional
alternatives. Occurrences of such additional alternatives shall be interpreted in their normal English
meaning.
The terms "clause", "subclause", "paragraph", and "annex" in this document are to be interpreted as
se 5.
described in ISO/IEC Directives, Part 2, Clau
The terms "normative" and "informative" in this document are to be interpreted as described
in ISO/IEC Directives, Part 2, Clause 3. In this document, clauses, subclauses, or annexes labeled
"(informative)" do not contain normative content. Notes and examples are always informative
elements.
The terms defined in DSP0004, DSP0223, and DSP1001 apply to this document. The following
additional terms are used in this document.
3.1
authoring function
the creation of the OVF package
3.2
chassis
a placement policy as defined in the class CIM_Chassis
3.3
conditional
indicates requirements to be followed strictly to conform to the document when the specified
conditions are met
3.4
deployment function
a function the result of which is a prepared virtual system
3.5
geographic
a placement policy referring to a geographic location (e.g., a country, a state, a province, a latlong)
3.6
guest software
the software that runs inside a virtual system
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INCITS 469-2015
3.7
mandatory
indicates requirements to be followed strictly to conform to the document and from which no deviation
is permitted
3.8
optional
indicates a course of action permissible within the limits of the document
3.9
rack
a placement policy as defined in the class CIM_Rack
3.10
site
a placement policy as defined in Access, Terminals, Transmission and Multiplexing (ATTM);
Broadband Deployment - Energy Efficiency and Key Performance Indicators; Part 2: Network sites;
Sub-part 1: Operator sites, Technical Report, ETSI TR 105 174-2-1 V1.1.1 (2009-10)
3.11
OVF package
a single compressed file or a set of files that contains the OVF descriptor file and may contain
associated virtual disks, operational metadata, and other files
3.12
OVF descriptor
an XML file that validates to DSP8023 and provides the information needed to deploy the OVF
package
3.13
virtualization platform
the hypervisor on which the virtual systems run
3.14
virtual appliance
a service delivered as a software stack that utilizes one or more virtual systems
3.15
virtual hardware
the processor, memory and I/O resources provided by a virtualization platform that supports a virtual
system
3.16
virtual system
as defined in the Virtual System Profile plus the guest software if any
3.17
virtual system collection
a collection of virtual systems
3.18
virtualization management
the software that performs resource allocation and management of virtual systems
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ISO/IEC 17203:2017(E)

 INCITS 469-2015
4 Symbols and abbreviated terms
The abbreviations defined in DSP0004, DSP0223, and DSP1001 apply to this document. The
following additional abbreviations are used in this document.
4.1
CIM
Common Information Model
4.2
IP
Internet Protocol
4.3
OVF
Open Virtualization Format
4.4
VS
virtual system
4.5
VSC
virtual system collection

5 OVF package
5.1 OVF package structure
An OVF package shall consist of the following files:
 one OVF descriptor with extension .ovf
 zero or one OVF manifest with extension .mf
 zero or one OVF certificate with extension .cert
 zero or more disk image files
 zero or more additional resource files, such as ISO images
The file extensions .ovf, .mf and .cert shall be used. See D.1 for an example.
An OVF package can be stored as either a single compressed file (.ova) or a set of files, as described
in 5.3 and 5.4. Both modes shall be supported.
An OVF package may have a manifest file containing the SHA digests of individual files in the
package. OVF packages authored according to this version of the specification shall use SHA256
digests. The manifest file shall have an extension .mf and the same base name as the .ovf file and
be a sibling of the .ovf file. If the manifest file is present, a consumer of the OVF package should
verify the digests in the manifest file in the OVF package by computing the actual SHA digests and
comparing them with the digests listed in the manifest file. The manifest file shall contain SHA digests
for all distinct files referenced in the References element of the OVF descriptor and for no other files.
See 7.1
The syntax definitions below use ABNF with the exceptions listed in ANNEX A.
The format of the manifest file is as follows:
 manifest_file = *( file_digest )
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INCITS 469-2015
 file_digest  = algorithm "(" file_name ")" "=" sp digest nl
 algorithm   = "SHA1" | "SHA256"
 digest    = *( hex-digit )
 hex-digit   = "0" | "1" | "2" | "3" | "4" | "5" | "6" | "7" | "8" | "9" | "a" |
"b" | "c" | "d" | "e" | "f"
 sp      = %x20
 nl      = %x0A
See D.1 for an example.
An OVF package may be signed by signing the manifest file. The digest of the manifest file is stored
in a certificate file with extension .cert file alon
...