HashiCorp has announced the public beta of HCP Packer, a free offering that helps DevOps teams track and automate build updates across their HashiCorp Packer and Terraform workflows. HCP Packer enables teams to create identical machine images for multiple clouds from a single source configuration, addressing issues such as tracking image lifecycle, updating images, and standardizing deployments. The tool provides features like channels to automate changes dynamically across child images and provisioning pipelines, allowing teams to ensure that all downstream builds are appropriately updated. HCP Packer also integrates with Terraform Provisioning Pipelines, enabling teams to reference and update images within their provisioning pipelines, reducing manual work. To get started, teams can sign up for HCP Packer for free and check out the Packer tutorial collection on HashiCorp Learn.