Install Proxmox VE on Debian Jessie

Introduction

BETA NOT FOR PRODUCTION

The installation of a supported Proxmox VE server should be done via Bare-metal_ISO_Installer. In some case it makes sense to install Proxmox VE on top of a running Debian Jessie 64-bit, especially if you want a custom partition layout. For this HowTO the following Debian Wheezy ISO was used: debian-8.1.0-amd64-netinst.iso.

Install a standard Debian Jessie (amd64)

Install a standard Debian Jessie (amd64), for details see Debian, go for a fixed IP.

Check /etc/hosts

Please make sure that your hostname is resolvable via /etc/hosts, i.e you need an entry in /etc/hosts which assigns an IPv4 address to that hostname.

Note: Make sure that no IPv6 address for your hostname is specified in /etc/hosts

Example /etc/hosts file:

root@proxmox-6-177:~# cat /etc/hosts

127.0.0.1 localhost.localdomain localhost
192.168.6.177 proxmox-6-177.proxmox.com proxmox-6-177 pvelocalhost

# The following lines are desirable for IPv6 capable hosts

::1     ip6-localhost ip6-loopback
fe00::0 ip6-localnet
ff00::0 ip6-mcastprefix
ff02::1 ip6-allnodes
ff02::2 ip6-allrouters
ff02::3 ip6-allhosts

Install Proxmox VE

Adapt your sources.list

Adapt your sources.list and add the Proxmox VE repository:

nano /etc/apt/sources.list

deb http://ftp.at.debian.org/debian jessie main contrib

# PVE test repository provided by proxmox.com
deb http://download.proxmox.com/debian jessie pvetest

# security updates
deb http://security.debian.org jessie/updates main contrib

Add the Proxmox VE repository key:

wget -O- "http://download.proxmox.com/debian/key.asc" | apt-key add -

Update your repository and system by running:

apt-get update && apt-get dist-upgrade

Install Proxmox VE packages

Install the Proxmox VE packages:

apt-get install proxmox-ve ntp ssh postfix ksm-control-daemon open-iscsi

Accept the suggestion to remove Exim and configure postfix according to your network.

Finally, reboot into your new Proxmox VE kernel.

Optional: Remove the Debian kernel:

apt-get remove linux-image-amd64 linux-image-3.16.0-4-amd64 linux-base

Check grub2 config by running:

update-grub

Connect to the Proxmox VE web interface

Connect to the admin web interface (https://youripaddress:8006) and configure your network according to your needs, finally reboot to check if everything is running as expected.

Configure apt to use the new packages repositories

In order to get latest updates, you need to add one of the new package repositories, see Package repositories

Optional: Developer Workstations with Proxmox VE and X11

Proxmox VE is primarily used as virtualization platform with NO additional software installed. In some case it makes sense to have a full desktop running on Proxmox VE, for example for developers using Proxmox VE as their primary workstation/desktop.

For example, just install XFCE4 desktop and Firefox/Iceweasel browser:

apt-get install xfce4 iceweasel lightdm

If you prefer LXDE desktop instead just do:

apt-get install lxde iceweasel

Make sure network-manager is not used, else pve-cluster will not start in some cases

apt-get purge network-manager