How To Install And Setup Vagrant And Virtual Machines On Mac M1 Chip.

While I was installing Vagrant and setting up Virtual Machines for CentOs7 and Ubuntu, I came across different issues in setting up the virtual machines on my M1 machine. This article is to show you the step-by-step guide on how to install and set up Vagrant and install any Virtual Machine on your Mac M1 chip.

First, make sure you have Homebrew on your Mac. Homebrew is a free and open-source software package management system that simplifies the installation of software on Apple's operating system, macOS, as well as Linux.

If you have Homebrew you can continue from the next step. If not,

Install VMware Fusion on an Apple M1/M2 chip-based Mac machine

1. Go to the VMware Customer Connect registration page and fill in the required details. Confirm your email address to ensure the proper activation of your profile.

2. Go to the VMware Fusion downloads page and choose the latest version to download the VMware Fusion. If prompted, log in to your VMware Customer Connect profile. If you do not have a profile, please create one.

3. Open the Finder app and navigate to the Downloads directory on your Mac Machine.

4. Open the VMware Fusion package, then double-click the icon and follow the onscreen instructions to install it into your machine.

5. During the installation process, a license key prompt appears. You'll find a Get a Free License Key button. Simply click the button to obtain the personal use license key and complete the installation.

   

Install Vagrant and its plugins on Apple M1chip

Vagrant is a tool for building and managing virtual machine environments in a single workflow”

#Install using Homebrew
$ brew cask install vagrant

Install manually on your M1 Machine

1. Download the Vagrant package.

2. Open the Finder app and navigate to the Downloads directory on your Mac machine.

3. Open the Vagrant package, then double-click the icon and follow the onscreen instructions.

4. Check the version using the command below

# Check Vagrant Version
$ sudo vagrant --version

Install Vagrant VMware utility on a Mac machine

1. Download the Vagrant VMware utility package.

2. Open the Finder app and navigate to the Downloads directory on your Mac machine.

3. Open the Vagrant VMware utility package, then double-click the icon and follow the onscreen instructions.

Install The Vagrant Manager On the M1 Machine

Install the Vagrant Manager, as it allows us to manage all VMs from one console

#Install Vagrant-Manager 
$ brew cask install vagrant-manager

Install the Vagrant VMware provider plugin on a Mac machine

To run the mentioned commands, you need to open the Terminal application, which is the default command-line interface for macOS.

# Install VMware provider plugin for Vagrant.
$ sudo vagrant plugin install vagrant-vmware-desktop

Setup and manage VMs on Mac machines using VMware Fusion and Vagrant

To successfully create Vagrantfiles and run VMS on your M1 Machine after installing Vagrant, VMware Fusion

1. Create a directory where you want to run your vagrant file

    $ mkdir vms
   

2. Change the directory to the newly created

    $ cd vms
   

3. When you're in the directory you run the following command

    $ vagrant init <box-name>
   

   Example:

     $ vagrant init gyptazy/centos9-arm64
   

   The above command creates a vagrant file in the directory. You can obtain more Vagrant Boxes from the Vagrant Cloud.

4. After a file named Vagrantfile has been placed in the current directory, which contains the configuration params. Start the VM using:

    $ vagrant up
   

   

5. Log in to the VM using:

    $ vagrant ssh
   

   

You can also go to the Vagrant Manager to manage the VMs running. You can perform various operations using the manager.

Manage VMs On M1 Machines Using VMware Fusion & Vagrant

You can halt, suspend and destroy VMs by using the following commands

1. Destroying the virtual machine by calling vagrant destroy will remove all traces of the guest machine from your system. It'll stop the guest machine, power it down, and remove all of the guest's hard disks.

    $ vagrant destroy
   

2. Suspending the virtual machine by calling vagrant suspend will save the current running state of the machine and stop it.

    $ vagrant suspend
   

3. Halting the virtual machine by calling vagrant halt will shut down the guest operating system and power down the guest machine.

    $ vagrant halt
   

4. Reloading the virtual machine by calling vagrant reload will reload the guest operating system and apply changes if necessary.

    $ vagrant reload
   

   You can also check other commands from the Vagrant command line.