Introduction toAzure Dev/Test Labs

Paul NicholsMexia Consulting

Enabling the Digital Enterprise

Who am I?• Developer for 20 years• Biztalk & Azure• Senior Consultant @ Mexia• www.geekswithblogs.net/PaulNichols/• @pauljnichols

Why Dev/Test Labs?

With Dev/Test Labs You Can…• Enable self service creation of environments

– But with the control & auditing• Integrate with your existing CI pipeline

– Scripted and stored in source control• Build your own base templates or artefacts repository

– Allows fine control over the provisioned machines and the software configuration

demo

What is DSC?

With Dsc You Can…• Remotely configure machines

– Install or remove server roles and features – Manage registry settings – Manage files and directories– Start, stop, and manage processes and services – Manage local groups and user accounts – Install and manage packages such as .msi and .exe – Manage environment variables – Run Windows PowerShell scripts – Fix a configuration that has drifted away from the desired state– Discover the actual configuration state on a given node

• Use Chocolatey to install all you favourite tools

demo

To summarise we talked about…• The Dev/Test labs offering

– Self service– Control– Auditing– Out of the box templates– Custom templates– ARM templates– Incorporating into CI pipeline

• Use of DSC & Chocolatey– Configure environments after provisioning– Control all machines centrally– Avoids complex base images & golden images

• My Bloghttp://www.geekswithblogs.net/PaulNichols/• Official Dev Test Site https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/devtest-lab/• Quick Start templates (GitHub)

https://github.com/Azure/azure-quickstart-templates/tree/diagnose_server_error/• Create a new VM template in Azure DevTest Labs• Create a new VM template in Azure DevTest Labs from an existing DevTest Lab / DTL VM• Create a new VM template in Azure DevTest Labs from an existing azure marketplace image

• Easily install software and stay up to date via Chocolatley http://www.chocolatley.org

• My DSC Dev machine Gist https://gist.github.com/PaulNichols/

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