First-run setup

The first time you open Virtainer Free in a browser, it takes you through a setup wizard instead of the console. The wizard is not optional: the host has no administrator account and no storage pool until you finish it.

Plan for the host to reboot at the end, and for the browser to lose the connection for a minute or two.

What the wizard asks for

1. Network

   Assign a role to each network interface the host found, and choose how the management address is configured. Exactly one interface carries the management network.

   If your change moves the host to a different address, Virtainer Free applies it as a trial and reopens the wizard at the new address. Confirm from there within five minutes. If you do not, the host rolls the change back on its own, which recovers an address that was wrong.

   The window recovers a configuration the host can still live without. It is not a rescue for a change that removes the link itself, and a rollback cannot be confirmed from a machine you cannot reach. When you are editing the bridge that carries the host’s only reachable interface, have console access to the machine, or someone who can power-cycle it, before you apply.

2. Storage

   Review the disks the host found and create a storage pool. This is where virtual machine disks, cached images, and data volumes live.

   You can skip this step and create the pool later from the Storage page, though skipping stores machine data on the system disk, and a pool cannot be added once machines exist.

   A host with no disk that could hold a pool has nothing to choose: the step says storage will live on the system disk and offers Continue. Add a disk later and a dedicated pool can be built from the Storage page.

3. Host

   Set the hostname and timezone, then create two accounts. The system account is the host’s login over the console and SSH, with sudo; the host has no direct root login. This is also where you can paste an SSH public key and choose whether SSH is enabled. The web account is the administrator username and password you will use to sign in to the console from now on. Both accounts start on one shared credential; split them if you prefer.

   The wizard has three steps. Finishing the last one reboots the host from within it, and the step shows Rebooting the host while it does. The reboot is required, because it clears the install-time boot settings and brings the host up in its normal running configuration. There is no fourth step to confirm.

The storage step erases disks

Creating a pool destroys everything on the disks you select. The wizard shows exactly which devices will be erased and asks you to acknowledge that list before it does anything. Read it. See Storage pools for the full flow.

After the reboot

Open the host’s address again and sign in with the web account you created. You land on the Dashboard, and the sidebar has the full console.

There is no activation step, no license key, and no product to register.

If the wizard reappears

The wizard only runs while setup is incomplete. If you see it again after finishing, the host was reset (see Danger Zone) or the setup never actually completed. Sign-in problems are different: those send you to the login page, not to the wizard.