Note that some Google's Debian Wheezy images are specifically optimized for their Andromeda SDN [1], especially when they running on us-central1-b or europe-west1-a zones, where Andromeda is enabled [2].

Also Ubuntu 14.04 LTS has much worse performance than Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, so it's better to stick to 12.04 LTS for now.

In my opinion it's better to port to Debian or to run Ubuntu image inside container hosted on Debian, until they will have native Ubuntu support.

[1] http://gigaom.com/2014/04/02/google-launches-andromeda-a-sof...

[2] http://googlecloudplatform.blogspot.co.il/2014/04/enter-andr...

"Also Ubuntu 14.04 LTS has much worse performance than Ubuntu 12.04 LTS"

Citation needed.

Wow, why is it so complicated? Can't you do it from the console?

Because they don't have ready-made ubuntu images, so you have to make your own first.

The simpler solution is to use their ready-made Debian images, which can be easily configured via CLI or API.