Practicing Microsoft Azure: Part 9 (Creating Virtual Machine From VS)

Before reading this article, I highly recommend reading the following previous parts:

• Introduction to Microsoft Azure: Part 1
• Introduction to Microsoft Azure: Part 2
• Introduction to Microsoft Azure: Part 3 (Data Service)
• Practicing Microsoft Azure: Part 4
• Practicing Microsoft Azure: Part 5 (App Service)
• Practicing Microsoft Azure: Part 6 (Cloud Computing)
• Practicing Microsoft Azure: Part 7 (Azure Web Role Project)
• Practicing Microsoft Azure: Part 8 (Deploying Azure Service From VS)

The sole objective of this article is to show how to manage the various components, for instance, website creation, cloud service creation, new virtual machine setup and many more of Azure development portals from the Visual Studio IDE. So far we have accomplished essential Azure service-related operations through its portal, but Visual Studio also leverages with the built-n Azure development portal access capabilities to streamline the operating of Azure services directly from the IDE that spares the hassle of opening or accessing the portal via a browser.

Getting Started

Although we can do nearly everything of Azure services using Visual Studio, in this section I will justify my claim only by showing new virtual machine creation and configuration. So, launch the Visual Studio 2012 development environment here and open Server Explorer from the View menu. Make sure you are connected with a good internet connection before delving into this operation. Since the following figure enumerates the various Azure cloud components, here interestingly, the server explorer can manipulate them because it can synchronize with the Azure development portal directly.

In this article, we shall learn how to configure the Windows Server OS in a virtual machine, hence check on “create virtual machine” after right-clicking the virtual machine as in the following:

Further, a corresponding dialog box asks about your current Azure subscription as well as instructs to choose it even as you log-in, in fact it will automatically display it as in the following:

Thereafter, as in an Azure development portal, you will encounter a huge list of currently installed Microsoft family operating systems in the form of images. However, you can choose here non-Microsoft family operating system. Since as stipulated earlier, choose the Windows Server 2008 operating system image from the list and proceed as in the following:

After selecting the corresponding operating system image, give it a meaningful name, for example tstVM2008 along with assigning a temporary user name and password that will be used later to enter into the operating system as in the following:

The next dialog will ask to specify a cloud service that will be bound to this virtual machine operating system, it is important to remember that the cloud service that you attach here, must not belong to any of the existing WebRoles or WorkerRoles as shown in the following figure. It is therefore recommended to create a new blank cloud service to go with this sample.

Here, we are creating a new blank cloud service as sanVMhost789 in the East Asia affinity group as in the following:

Since we are attaching a reference of a blank cloud service to this virtual machine it is natural to allocate storage for the resource utilized by the services. Henceforth, configure storage for this virtual machine as in the following:

Next, leave the virtual network setting blank here, in fact such information can be assigned later on. Specify the cloud service and storage account details here and proceed. We are on the verge of achieving the feat.

Subsequently, the mechanism configures two services as Remote Desktop and PowerShell in this virtual machine by default, in fact we can optionally open other essential services like HTTP, HTTPS, SMTP and many more.

As yet, all the essential parameters have been configured in connection with creating a new virtual machine, now the Visual Studio initiates the final process that will naturally take some time as in the following:

Once you have ensured the successful creation of the virtual machine message, you can even dully confirm with this from the Azure development portal itself whereas you can see the tstVM2008 virtual machine is running.

Again, observe the virtual machine section from the Server Explorer, here right-click the Windows Server 2008 machine to connect it from the Remote Desktop as in the following:

Finally, enter the credentials, including server name, user name and password in the Remote Desktop Connection utility, set up during the virtual machine configuration earlier. If everything is in the right direction then you"ll be able to encounter your new Windows Server 2008 installed virtual machine.

Summary

This article offered an understanding of operating Azure service components from Visual Studio IDE rather than relying on the development portal. In fact, such mechanism eases the undertaking of the developer or administrator who can directly access the Azure components from Visual Studio independently. After reading this article, even a layman himself, can create and configure virtual machine installed with any Microsoft family operating system using the Visual Studio IDE.