[CentOS] CentOS 7 regression, can not take a KVM qcow2, convert it and boot it on ESXi...

Thu Feb 4 02:33:20 UTC 2016
Martinx - ジェームズ <thiagocmartinsc at gmail.com>

Guys,

 I have a Packer build procedure, that works like a charm, when with CentOS 6.7.

 Exemplifying:

 1- Packer (with virtio disk) + QEmu + CentOS 6.7 ISO;
 2- Create a RAW image;
 3- Convert the RAW image into QCOW2 for KVM hypervisors (okay);
 4- Convert the RAW image into VMDK for ESXi hypervisors (okay).

 However, when doing the very same procedure, with CentOS 7.2 ISO, it
does not boot on ESXi!

 After research, I realized that it is not auto-loading the sd_mod on ESXi.

 I'm seeing errors like this:

 dracut-initqueue timeout
 dracut-initqueue timeout ....

 And it drops to "dracut#" shell, where I can see that there is no
/dev/sda listed on /proc/partitions.

 I think I tried everything!

 My last try was, during Packer build, to append "add_drivers+="
sd_mod" to /etc/dracut.conf and re-building initramdisk by running
"dracut -f". However, it does not boot either (on ESXi)!

 I can still boot using Rescue mode on VMWare, then, I can see that
sd_mod is inside of initramfs as expected (lsinitrd FTW) but, dracut
does not load it! I tried "force_drivers+=" sd_mod", doesn't work
too...

 Weird is that, while during Rescue, if I run "dracut -f" again, then,
it works! Normal boot proceeds... But this is unacceptable, because I
can not ship a half-broken VMDK and tell customers to first boot on
Rescue, run "dracut -f" and then, use the system.

 So, why the heck the "dracut -f" executed when as a KVM guest have no
effect for later ESXi usage?

 What am I missing?

 I really appreciate any help!

Thanks!
Thiago