We've run into an issue with the New-Deployment Azure Powershell commandlet timing out; we've put in a bug report with MS. While they gave us an explanation for it (the path and timeout threshold used to upload through commandlets is different then what's used by the web portal); they don't have a fix for us.
We need to get this running so we can automate our build deployments, so we're looking into developing a custom commandlet to replace New-Deployment using the Azure SDK; hoping this path will not have the timeout issues the commandlet did. But before we go down that route; are there any other scriptable tools I can use to replace the New-Deployment functionality? I looked at Cloudberry for Windows Azure; but that doesn't have a scriptable interface yet.
Any constructive input is greatly appreciated.
If you are developing worker roles, then you can reuse the dynamic assembly loading system that comes with the execution framework of Lokad.Cloud.
Basically, you just have to upload a ZIP archive containing all your DLLs toward the Blob Storage and the framework takes care of the rest. Extra Bonus: worker restart takes about 10s (vs +10min for a classical deployment)
A similar behavior could be obtained with web roles too, but this part hasn't been implemented in Lokad.Cloud yet.
FYI, we solved this issue by writing a custom tool to upload the package with a higher timeout tolerance; as well as using CSManage (http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/Release/ProjectReleases.aspx?ProjectName=windowsazuresamples&ReleaseId=3233) to create the deployment after uploading.
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Our Azure DevOps implementation deploys both an ARM template and runs several powershell scripts to fully deploy our solution. Currently it is modifying the Azure storage logging and metric properties using the Azure Powershell commands Set-AzureStorageServiceMetricsProperty and Set-AzureStorageServiceLoggingProperty.
While it is perfectly acceptable to continue using these commands, we're considering adding the equivalent JSON to our ARM template. Is this possible? If so, is this documented anywhere? I've looked through the Azure resource manager template reference, but that doesn't seem to have what I need. Any pointers or even example JSON is appreciated.
Yes, that is possible. Here's the article talking about that:
https://github.com/MicrosoftDocs/azure-docs/blob/master/articles/monitoring-and-diagnostics/monitoring-enable-diagnostic-logs-using-template.md#non-compute-resource-template
ARM Json couldnt change without notice (well, no one would warn YOU personally, but they have breaking changes EXTREMELY RARELY, my 3 year old arm templates still work). So there nohting to fear, really.
I want to create/update the websites/cloud services in Azure in C#. My objective is to deploy the website/cloud service in Azure without any user intervention.
Can anyone please help me to resolve below queries?
Can we manage Azure websites/cloud services using C# code? If yes then how (any library/api/nuget package)?
If it is not possible in C#, then what are other options to achieve this? I read WebDeploy(MsDeploy), powershell can do this work but I am not sure which one is best in this scenario and how to use them.
This completely depends on your scenario. If you have got a system to run your powershell script from, this might be a good option (https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/articles/powershell-install-configure/) You could also use the cross platform command line tools to script your deployment / web app creation. There are different other options, especially for continous deployment to a web app. You can for example connect your github repo to an existing web app and deploy from that repository.
The C# library you were looking for should be this one:
https://github.com/Azure/azure-sdk-for-net/tree/master/src/ResourceManagement/WebSite
We've got some legacy on-premise apps that we're evaluating moving off-site, and we are evaluating all our options. I understand that Azure Web Sites would be a lot easier to setup, but at this point it looks like may need some of the additional control that Cloud Services gives us.
However, everything I've read about Cloud Services so far demonstrates how you build an app and then deploy the build to the cloud. Similarly, you can connect to a Visual Studio Online repository, define builds in VSO, and after a commit, a build is performed and the build is deployed to the cloud.
However, in our case some of our pages are Classic ASP pages. In the event that one of these pages changes, I have not been able to figure out a workflow that allows us to deploy the updated files. Remember, classic ASP files do not have a "build" process; it's like a powershell script that is interpreted at runtime.
There is no Visual Studio solution or project involved with these apps. It's just a package of files we want to upload. For a "proof of concept" I decided to start with the simplest possible "app," a simple "hello.txt" file, and I have not been able to figure out a way to deploy this without "wrapping" it in a Visual Studio solution.
I was hoping that I could use, e.g., Publish-AzureServiceProject, however this appears to need a ServiceDefinition.csdef file, and again, I'm not sure how to do this without setting up solution in Visual Studio--a solution that wouldn't be used for anything.
I have a feeling I'm missing something and just need to find the appropriate publish settings file, or proper use of an Azure cmdlet. Is there a straightforward way to publish a package of files to an Azure Cloud Service?
Josh, you will need to package the files into a deployable package. This can be achieved using the cspack commandline tool and a hand-crafted definition file. Your ASP files would be treated as 'content' in this case.
The easiest way would be just to create stub Visual Studio Solution and include a 'Cloud Service' project to which you add all the ASP files. This way all your files will be redeployed in the event that your Web Roles require recycling by the Azure fabric.
While this might seem like a big overhead if you need to tweak just a single file, it is the correct way to manage PaaS deployments in Azure. If this process doesn't work for you then you should consider moving to an IaaS VM you fully manage yourself.
One thing that may be helpful is to realize that the web role in Cloud Services are just VM's using IIS. For that reason, you can connect to them just like any other server, via RDP, FTP, etc. Our team often bypasses the overhead of simple things, like deploying a new CSS file, an image, etc. by simply copying it in the old school way.
Again, not sure if this helps you, but old school techniques work just as well. :-)
I'm planning to do an automated deployment of a website,but im kind of stuck at this moment. I have looked at MS-Deploy, it got all the functions for deploying Website. I have a created a Web application package (.ZIP file) and I tested this on my local machine it is deploying website i.e
Create Web application under default website
Publishing files in c:\inetpub\wwwroot directory
Set ACLs on directories,etc
But i want to achieve few more extra steps for example:
Check whether Web application exists in Default Website, if not
create a Web application
Check whether Application pool exists, if not create a App pool
(given name) with a specific credentials and Assign App-pool to Web
application
Before it deploys take a backup copy of existing Web application (IF
exists)
publish offline page (app_offline.htm)
publishing the files to application directory
Replace the AppSettings section(in web.config file) to with actual values
Encrypt Web.config connection string
If there is any error whilst installing web application, rollback the web application to its previous version
The question is whether can i achieve all these functions via MS-Deploy or do i need to write any script, please suggest me what scripting language should i use
Please let me know if you need more information.
Thanks in advance
I'm not an expert on this topic but have been doing a bit of research on automated deployment with MSDeploy lately, and think I can offer the following;
This is default behaviour if you use the iisApp provider.
I know you can do this with the appPoolConfig provider, but I'm unsure as to how you would run this and #1 together as part of the same package. Perhaps as part of a pre- or post-sync command?
This is standard in v3, as long as it's set up on the server. Not used it myself, but read this anyway.
Fiddly. Not supported in MSDeploy, but you can vote for it if you want. Also, check out this SO answer (and also worth checking out PackageWeb, but the same answers' author).
Not sure I follow. This is done as part of a successful deployment, surely?
Use web.config transforms and optionally the aforementioned PackageWeb for a neat way to do this. Also check out Web Publish Profiles.
Difficult. My understanding is that the encryption is based on the machine.config, so you'd either have to run a post-sync script which would run some sort of remote Powershell script on the remote server to encrypt the web.config using aspnet_regiis, or you'd have to encrypt the config as part of your build process and then muck about with custom keys and the RSA provider (some info here).
I hope that helps. As I said, I'm no expert, so happy to be corrected by those more knowledgeable. Maybe also worth mentioning that MSDeploy is a lot more powerful if you use it via the command-line rather than creating packages from VS, although there is a bit of a learning curve to go with it.
Newbie to automated azure deployment here! I have the happy task of automating our deployment to the cloud. I have also done some reading and discovered that the 2 main tools are MSbuild and Powershell. Please could anyone tell me why i would use one over the other or indeed if there are any better ways to automate the deployment. Keeping in mind that my main concern is performance and i need this deplymrnt to be as fast as possible.
Any insight would be most welcome.
I'm a fan of using PowerShell for deployments. It's pretty quick to set up and the script can be pretty straight forward.
MSBuild can be great too. I use MSBuild from TFS Team Build to kick off a PowerShell script to do the deployment. Works like a champ.
A good starting point would be http://blogs.msdn.com/b/tomholl/archive/2011/12/06/automated-build-and-deployment-with-windows-azure-sdk-1-6.aspx. This blog does a great job of showing you how to build and deploy with Team Build.
If you don't want/need the Team Build and MSBuild part, then just look at his PowerShell script. That covers the basics of getting a deployment from your dev environment to Windows Azure.
You should use Web Deploy, it only takes about a minute to deploy a fix. See these links
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/cloud/archive/2011/04/19/enabling-web-deploy-for-windows-azure-web-roles-with-visual-studio.aspx
http://channel9.msdn.com/Blogs/funkyonex/Speed-Up-Azure-Deployments-with-the-New-Web-Deployment-Feature
At SplendidCRM, we had a similar need to automate deployments to Azure, but as our need was to service our live customers, we had to develop using C#. We have been watching Azure for many years, but it was not until they provided a DNS service did it make sense to make the move. Using the Azure Resource Manager (ARM) libraries, we were able to automate VM creation, SQL database creation and DNS name creation. In addition to the Microsoft documentation for ARM, we found it particularly useful to be able to get the Microsoft source code for the PowerShell scripts that wrap ARM. This is because the documentation does not always provide a complete set of settings.
In the end, we decided to release the Azure deployment code as part of a new Ultimate edition that combines order and customer management with software deployment.