VMware to Cockpit

This guide covers migrating a VMware VM into a KVM/libvirt host fleet managed by Awanio Cockpit. Cockpit is the multi-host aggregator: you pick which host in the fleet the VM should land on, and Cockpit places it there.

It continues from the shared steps in the User Guide — make sure you have enabled CBT (for warm migration) and signed in to Condensa first.

Before you start

• Complete Enable CBT and Sign in to Condensa from the overview.
• Have a reachable Cockpit endpoint and a root-organization service account (Client ID + Client Secret) for it. See the Cockpit integration guide for how Condensa talks to Cockpit.
• Unlike the CEP path, you do not take a VMware snapshot by hand — for warm migrations Condensa creates and cleans up the snapshots for you.

Add the Cockpit provider

Click the Provider tab, then click the Add Provider button. In the form:

1. Vendor — choose Awanio Cockpit.
2. Name — a display name (e.g. Cockpit Jakarta). Add an optional Label to tell apart several Cockpit providers, and an optional Description.
3. Under Connection Details:
   • API Endpoint — the base URL of the Cockpit API, e.g. https://cockpit-host:7771/api/v1.
   • Client ID — the service account name (access key). The service account must belong to the root organization; org-scoped accounts are rejected.
   • Client Secret — the secret shown once when the service account was created.
   • Allow insecure connection — tick this only for a lab endpoint with a self-signed certificate.
4. Click Create Provider.

The new provider appears in the Providers list.

Create the migration

Click the Migrations tab, then click the Create Migration button. The wizard has four steps.

Step 1 — Basic Info and target

1. Enter a Migration Name and an optional Description.
2. Target Provider — choose the Cockpit provider you just created.
3. Target Host — choose the host in the Cockpit fleet that should receive the VM. (This selector is specific to the Cockpit path.)
4. Target Storage Pool (optional) — where the migrated disk is written. Leave blank to use the host's default image pool.
5. Target Network (optional) — the migrated VM gets one NIC (e1000) on this network. Leave as None to keep it disconnected and avoid an IP conflict with the still-running source.
6. Options (each is the default for the migration; you can override per VM in the Review step):
   • Power on the VM after migration — leave off to keep the target powered off until you start it yourself.
   • Warm migration (live, minimal downtime) — copy the disk while the guest keeps running, then cut over with a short pause. Warm needs CBT enabled on the source (see the overview); otherwise the VM migrates cold.
   • Manual cutover (warm migrations) — the migration waits for you to shut the guest down from inside the OS at your chosen maintenance window, instead of powering it off automatically.
7. Name Prefix (optional) — prepended to every migrated VM's name.

Click Next.

Step 2 — Source provider

Select the VMware source provider and its Datacenter, then click Next.

Step 3 — Select VMs

Pick one or more VMs to migrate. Each row shows its power state and, for VMware, whether CBT is on — a running VM with CBT off (and no snapshot) can't be migrated warm. Click Next.

Step 4 — Review

Review the migration. The summary shows the target Cockpit host, storage pool, network, and per-VM options — adjust any per-VM override here. If it is OK, click Create Migration.

The migration appears in the list with a Preparing status.

Start and monitor the migration

1. Click the action menu (three dots on the right of the row), then select Start Migration.
2. The status changes to Running and progress increases toward 100%. For a warm migration you'll see the phase move from the initial data copy to the final cut-over.
3. On completion the status changes to Success. Click the migration name to see per-disk detail and the log.

The migration list, status badges, and detail view are identical in layout to the CEP guide — only the Target Provider column reflects your Cockpit provider.

Verify on Cockpit

Open the Cockpit dashboard, go to the target host, and confirm the migrated VM is present and (if you chose to power it on) running. Attach or adjust the NIC there if you left the network as None during migration.

Screenshots for the running/verify steps

End-to-end warm screenshots (Running → Success → the VM on the Cockpit host) are captured against a Cockpit build that includes the warm-ingest data plane. They will be added once that build is deployed. The wizard and provider screenshots above are from the live UI.