Commands for First Launching

When launching a CVM instance for the first time, you can pass user data to the CVM by passing a text (with no format restriction) and execute the text.
This document uses Linux CVM as an example to describe how to output "Hello Tencent Cloud" by passing a Shell script when launching the CVM for the first time.
The log file (/var/log/cloud-init-output.log) output by Cloud-init catches the output of the console.

Notes

• A command can be executed by passing a text only on the first time of launching a CVM.
• The passed text must be encoded with Base64. **Please encode in Linux environment to avoid format incompatibility.
• The text, which is input as the user data, is executed using the root permission. Therefore, sudo command is not required in the script. Note: All the files you created belong to root. If you need to grant non-root users with the access permission, modify the corresponding permission in the script.
• Adding these tasks to the startup of the CVM will increase its startup time. Wait a few minutes until the tasks complete, and then test whether they are executed successfully.
• In this example, Shell script must start with #! and the path directing to the interpreter of the script to be read.

Step 1: Write Shell script

#!/bin/bash
echo "Hello Tencent Cloud."

Note:
Shell script must start with #! and the path directing to the interpreter of the script to be read. For more information on Shell script, please see BASH Programming of the Linux Documentation Project (tldp.org).

Step 2: Encode the script file with Base64

Note:
Please encode in Linux environment to avoid format incompatibility.

Suppose that the script file you created in step 1 is script_text. You can encode the file using Base64 command in Linux environment, as shown below:

# Encode the file with Base64
base64 script_text

# The encoded result :
IyEvYmluL2Jhc2gKCmVjaG8gIldlbGNvbWUgVG8gVGVuY2VudCBDbG91ZC4iCg==

# Decode the returned result with Base64 and verify whether it is the command to be executed.
echo "IyEvYmluL2Jhc2gKZWNobyAiSGVsbG8gVGVuY2VudCBDbG91ZC4iCg==" | base64 -d

Step 3: Pass the text

We provide multiple methods to launch an instance and here we introduce two of them. Please choose a method as needed:

Passing on the official website or the console

When you create a CVM on the official website or the console, select Advanced Configuration in 4. Set Security Group and CVM step. Enter the encoded result (IyEvYmluL2Jhc2gKCmVjaG8gIldlbGNvbWUgVG8gVGVuY2VudCBDbG91ZC4iCg== in this example) of step 2 in user defined data item. Finish the creation and launch the CVM.
Tencent Cloud CVM executes the script using the open-source software cloud-init. For more information on cloud-init, please see cloud-init's official website.

Passing via API

When creating a CVM via API, you can pass the text by assigning the value of the encoded result of step 2 to UserData parameter of RunInstances API. The following is an example of the parameter of CVM creation request with UserData.

https://cvm.tencentcloudapi.com/?Action=RunInstances
  &Version=2017-03-12
  &Placement.Zone=ap-guangzhou-2
  &ImageId=img-pmqg1cw7
  &UserData=IyEvYmluL2Jhc2gKCmVjaG8gIldlbGNvbWUgVG8gVGVuY2VudCBDbG91ZC4iCg==
  &<Common request parameters>