Comment 6 for bug 826798

Tom,
  The issue is that nova uses 'qemu-img convert' to convert a vmdk to a raw file before booting it. qemu's vmdk support is minimal, and does not support the commonly created vmdks by other tools.
  The end result is that for most real-world cases, nova's vmdk support will not work.

  I'm not aware of anything that would have changed this situation.
  Thus, I suspect the bug is still valid, even if low priority.