packer/website/content/docs/datasources/hcp/index.mdx

---
description: |
  Data sources used to data from the HCP Packer registry.
page_title: HCP - Data sources
sidebar_title: Overview
---

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# HCP Packer Registry Data sources

The HCP Packer registry bridges the gap between image factories and image
deployments, allowing development and security teams to work together to create,
manage, and consume images in a centralized way.

The HCP Packer registry stores metadata about your images, including when they
were created, where the image exists in the cloud, and what (if any) git commit
is associated with your image build. You can use the registry to track
information about the golden images your Packer builds produce, clearly
designate which images are appropriate for test and production environments,
and query for the right golden images to use in both Packer and Terraform
configurations.

Packer has two data sources that work together to retrieve information from the
HCP Packer registry:

- [hcp-packer-iteration](/docs/datasources/hcp/hcp-packer-iteration) -
  retrieves information about an iteration in HCP Packer registry
- [hcp-packer-image](/docs/datasources/hcp/hcp-packer-image) - retrieves
  information about a specific image created in the HCP Packer registry

These data sources are intended to be used together to determine source images
for pipelined Packer builds.

## How to use this plugin

This plugin comes bundled with the Packer core, so you do not need to install
it separately. Please install Packer v1.7.7 or above to use the latest version
of the HCP Packer registry datasources.